The Winners of the 3QD Arts & Literature Prize 2015

Posted on by S. Abbas Raza

2015 A and L Kramnick 3 ArtsStrange2015 Winner 2015 science charme

Jonathan Kramnick has picked the three winners from the nine finalists:

  1. Top Quark, $500: Joanna Walsh, Ventimiglia
  2. Strange Quark, $200: David Kurnick, The Essential Gratuitousness of César Aira
  3. Charm Quark, $100: Sarah Blackwood, Editing as Carework

Here is what Jonathan had to say about them:

This is a great time for public art writing and literary criticism, with new venues of review and discussion popping up all over the internet. The essays I picked all in one way or another present the intimate and individual experience of an artwork in compelling, public language. That is not an easy thing to do.

Top Quark: Joanna Walsh, Ventimiglia. A variation on the aesthetic education genre, complete with travels to Italy. A beautiful meditation on beauty.
Strange Quark: David Kurnick, The Essential Gratuitousness of César Aira. Sentences that curl gorgeously around a singular and strange literary corpus.
Charm Quark: Sarah Blackwood, Editing as Carework. A short, moving piece on gender and editing from a voice helping us redefine what it means to be a public intellectual.

Congratulations also from 3QD to the winners (remember, you must claim the money within one month from today—just send me an email). And feel free, in fact we encourage you, to leave your acceptance speech as a comment here! And thanks to everyone who participated. Many thanks also, of course, to Jonathan Kramnick for doing the final judging.

The three prize logos at the top of this post were designed by Sughra Raza, me (using a photo by Margit Oberrauch) and Carla Goller. I hope the winners will display them with pride on their own blogs!

Details about the prize here.