Jessie Fisher, Assistant Professor of painting at KCAI, received the Ninth Annual Ohio Young Painters award for realism in 2009.  The Juor for this year's competition is Peter Plagens. Plagens is a painter who’s shown with the Nancy Hoffman Gallery in New York since 1974, and was also art critic for Newsweek (1989-2003). His work was the subject of a retrospective in 2004-2005 at the Fisher Museum at the University of Southern California, in Los Angeles; the exhibition traveled to Columbia College in Chicago, and the Butler Institute of American Art in Ohio. He has received fellowships from the John Simon Guggenheim Foundation (painting), the National Endowment for the Arts (painting, art criticism), The Andy Warhol Foundation / Creative Capital (arts writing) and the National Arts Journalism Program. Plagens is the author of two books of art criticism—Sunshine Muse: Art on the West Coast, 1945-70 and Moonlight Blues: An Artist’s Art Criticism—as well as a novel, Time for Robo. His online novel, The Art Critic, was published as an e-book by Hol Art Books in 2012, and his monograph, Bruce Nauman: The True Artist, will be published by Phaidon, in May, 2014. Currently, he writes the a bi-weekly art-review column for The Wall Street Journal. He lives in New York City with his wife, the painter Laurie Fendrich.The William and Dorothy Yeck purchase prize was awarded to Fisher by Miami University for her painting, Self-Portrait with Kenny, which is now part of the Universitys' 21st Century Painting collection. Fisher will return to the Hiestand Galleries with a solor exhibition of recent work the following year in conjuntion with the next Ohio Young Painters Prize Competition.

Young Painters Competition-

Miami University in Oxford, Ohio 

Artists between the ages of 25-35, are asked to send 10 images and a current CV that represents a recent direction in their work. 10 finalists are chosen who to participate in a finalists exhibition where the juror will choose the winners based on his/her expereince with the work first-hand. An exhibition opening and award announcement ceremony will be held in conjunction with the Jurors lecture. The 1st Place winner will receive the Willaim and Dorothy Yeck Purchase Prize of $10,000.00 as well as begin given a solo exhibition the following year in conjunction with the next competition. 2nd and 3rd place winners prizes will receive prizes of $1,500.00 and $1,000 respectively.