The winner of Hugo Boss Asia Art 2015 award is Maria Taniguchi, as announced in a ceremony at the Rockbund Art Museum (RAM) last night.

Taniguchi is the recipient of a ¥300,000 ($46,948) stipend, which will go towards developing her practice.

“With the precious contribution of the Hugo Boss Asia Art 2015 jury members, we are extremely proud to award the female artist Maria Taniguchi from Manila, Philippines,” Larys Frogier, chair of the Hugo Boss Asia Art jury and director of RAM, said in a statement.

“Her very singular, humble, but extremely focused practice of painting and video enriched the realm of media and raised a unique sensitivity of making the picture with infinite possibilities of meaning,” he added.

Larys Frogier, Maria Taniguchi, and Marc Le Mat at the Hugo Boss Asia Art 2015 award ceremony.
Photo: Courtesy Hugo Boss Asia Art.

There was much speculation about the relatively new award leading up to the announcement, with Moe Satt tipped as a front-runner. Satt was just one of six nominees for the prize which is intended to support young artists from China and South-East Asia at the beginning of their careers.

Taniguchi was born in 1981 in Dumaguete, Philippines, and lives and works in Manila. Through her voluminous brick paintings, sculptures, and videos, Taniguchi tirelessly explores the possibilities of form via a strong investment of both time and labor. In her work, the artist reflects the experience of living amid the socio-political situation and economic structure of the Philippines.

Installation view of works by Maria Taniguchi.
Photo: Courtesy Hugo Boss Asia Art.

“[Taniguchi’s] never ending development of brick paintings engages subtle dialogues and blurs the frontiers with sculpture, architecture, installation, offering the spectators a powerful experience of the physical, the geo-political and the mental limitations/extensions of the inside-out space/time representations,” Frogier explained.

“Her detailed video compositions of objects, architectonic elements, and color spectrums turn out the repetition and the familiar into a full practice of difference and strangeness. Maria Taniguchi solidly positions her work, without any compromise, into the context of Asia and international contemporary art,” he added.

An exhibition of works by Taniguchi and the five other nominees—Guan Xiao, Huang Po-Chih, Moe Satt, Vandy Rattana, and Yang Xinguang—is currently on view at the “Hugo Boss Asia Art 2015” exhibition at RAM.

Installation view of works by Maria Taniguchi at Rockbund Art Museum.
Photo: Courtesy Hugo Boss Asia Art.

This prize for emerging Asian artists boasts an impressive jury including Hou Hanru, artistic director of MAXXI in Rome, super-collector Patrizia Sandretto Re Rebaudengo, and Li Qi, senior curator at the Rockbund Art Museum.

Taniguchi is the second winner of the biennial award. The winner of the 2013 award was Hong Kong-based artist Kwan Sheung Chi.

“Hugo Boss Asia Art 2015” is on view at RAM from October 30, 2015 – January 3, 2016.