ARTIST OF THE YEAR – 2024 WINNERS

ITSLIQUID Group is pleased to announce the WINNERS of the ARTIST OF THE YEAR 2024, a competition open to anyone and established to increase and develop the art market and the dialogue between collectors, art critics, journalists, and art lovers. Making contemporary art accessible to all.

Artworks have been judged based on creativity, originality, quality of work, and overall artistic ability. Winners have been chosen based on the quality of a single entry as well as the quality of overall work.

Winners 2024
Elen Alien . UK
Peter Backhaus . Sweden
Jean Doulliez . Belgium
Heike Eiber . Germany
Zdene Flerin . Slovenia
Andrea Harold . Austria
Katja Lührs .Germany
Margot Neuhaus . USA

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ARTIST OF THE YEAR – 2024 Winners

Elen Alien . UK

Elen Alien is a London-based artist. She employs a diverse range of mediums, including sculpture, digital art, oil painting, and herbaria in her practice that transcends borders between nature, technology, and human identity. Elen Alien’s art is her emotional response to the events and mood of the surrounding world and her way to digest information, survive changes, and understand herself better. Inspired by personal experiences, psychoanalytic and philosophical theories, places, and materials around her, her art invites viewers to contemplate their own inner worlds.

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Peter Backhaus . Sweden

Peter Backhaus, a German artist now captivating the art scene, is renowned for his bold and unfiltered style. As a proponent of Archetypal Expressionism, his work is a blend of poetic and musical elements that deeply connect with the audience. His art, transcending the barriers of time and space, delves into the human psyche, establishing him as a prominent figure in the art world. Backhaus’s artistry is a play of contradictions, inviting viewers into a realm where reality and existential freedom clash. His work vibrates with life, marked by bold colors, dynamic forms, and lively brushwork, reflecting the vibrancy of urban life that inspires him.

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Jean Doulliez . Belgium

Jean Doulliez expresses himself through different techniques in the search for his aesthetic ideal. In parallel with modernist architectural training, his universe is built little by little in a controlled lyricism made up of often fluid forms that evoke movement. These are the ones that come closest to life forms because they symbolize a natural dynamic. The architect is attracted by the concrete space, the lived form and the symbolic image. Here, the painter gradually plays with mystery, on the border between figuration and the abstract. Room for imagination as long as the reading is not immediate. Nothing should be shown without an element of ambiguity and mystery.

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Heike Eiber . Germany

Born in 1961 in Düsseldorf, she was introduced to architecture, design, and modern painting at an early age through her father (an architect and painter). The fascination with art never left her, but her demanding job left her with little time for concrete artistic pursuits for a long time. Her works are predominantly abstract mixed-media pieces, characterized by brushstrokes that range from delicate to bold and gestural. The pieces are created informally, often in many layers, which lend depth and structure to the artwork. Lower layers sometimes partially shine through or deliberately stand out. Every process leaves its traces – often, one color demands the presence of another. Like an organic being, a painting grows and only takes on its final appearance after many stages of work, with the original concept sometimes receding into the background.

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Zdene Flerin . Slovenia

Zdene Flerin is a contemporary artist from Slovenia. After several years of exploring various styles and materials, he has developed a unique and inventive oil painting technique. He prefers the vividness of oil paints over the passive hues of acrylics, as oil paints offer greater precision and the ability to make corrections, allowing her to create truly perfected works. His art is a quest for balance and harmony, using rich, contrasting colors and bold lines to depict complex human emotions. Through his work, he aims to provoke thought and inspire a sense of harmony in his audience.

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Andrea Harold . Austria

Since childhood, she has been intensely engaged with drawing, painting, and photography. Initially, she focused on drawings and studies using pencil, charcoal, and oil pastels. For the past 10 years, her focus has been acrylic painting, resin art, and mixed media. “Capturing the Art of Life “is an expression that implies making the most out of life by living consciously, creatively, and mindfully. It means recognizing and appreciating the beauty, joy, and meaning of life. Shaped by challenge and loss, I am trying to build bridges between grief and the joy of life, striving to create a space where viewers can feel the essence of life. She aims for her works to inspire pausing, reflecting, and recognizing the beauty of life in all its facets. Using contemporary language, every brushstroke represents an emotion, an experience, or a moment of joy or pain.

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Katja Lührs . Germany

Katja Lührs was born in Rochlitz, Germany. Discovered at the age of eighteen by New York fashion photographer Mike Reinhardt and has worked for magazines at home and abroad (including Vogue, Elle, Bazaar, Marie Claire, Petra, Stern, Madame, Twen). As an actress, she appeared in front of the camera for films (including The Woman Without Body, Robin Hood) and TV series (including Schwarzwaldklinik, Marienhof, Dr. Stefan Frank).

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Margot Neuhaus . USA

Margot S. Neuhaus is an artist working in sculpture, painting, and photography. Born in Mexico City to Polish Jewish refugees, she spent her formative years there before moving to the USA with her family. When Margot sets out to work, she often sits on the ground or the floor, surrounding herself with the natural materials she uses. She plays with these materials, arranging them in patterns that resonate with her, carving lines that follow the grain, or drawing them along the length of a breath. Through this process, a communication emerges between her and the material.

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ARTIST OF THE YEAR 2025

ITSLIQUID Group officially presents ARTIST OF THE YEAR, a competition open to anyone and established to increase and develop the art market and the dialogue between collectors, art critics, journalists and art lovers. Making contemporary art accessible to all.

The winner will be awarded ‘Artist of the Year’, will be represented by ITSLIQUID Group for one year and will take part in some selected exhibitions in Venice, Rome and London ITSLIQUID Galleries during 2026. The winner will be featured and interviewed on ITSLIQUID Platform, promoted extensively worldwide and considered for any upcoming curatorial projects of ITSLIQUID Group.

Click here to read more.

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ABOUT US

ITSLIQUID is a web-based information platform, founded in 2001 by Luca Curci, dedicated to the worldwide distribution of information about calls for entries, exhibitions and events at some of the world’s leading art galleries, museums and foundations selected. ITSLIQUID has already built a readership of more than 300.000 qualified subscribers. Among them architects, designers, artists, collectors, art critics, curators, dealers, and other personalities of the International art, architecture and design world. It provides advertising services, press office services for events and projects, articles and specials published on the website, and media partnership services.

During the last 20 years, ITSLIQUID Group has become a cultural hub between creatives, exhibition spaces and art lovers. Among our international partners, are Art Now Fair, Art Vancouver, Design Tokyo, INDEX Qatar, INDEX Saudi, The Big 5 Construct Dubai, The Big 5 Construct Qatar, Photo LA Los Angeles and international magazines like Art Style. ITSLIQUID Group supports some of the most important no-profit organizations, like UNFCCC – United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, SSCS – Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, One Tree Planted, The Ocean CleanUp and Plastic Oceans, with the goal to increase public awareness about environmental issues. Click here to find out more.

ITSLIQUID GROUP includes a section dedicated to the organization of international art events, managing exhibitions of painting, photography, video art, installation and performance; it organizes solo and collective shows, art residencies and international contests. Its object is to use new technologies to globalize the language of art, and to connect artists working in every part of the world.

ITSLIQUID Group manages a variety of art spaces all over the world; among them Palazzo Albrizzi-Capello in Venice and different historical buildings, ELEMENTS Contemporary Art Space in the London city centre and other different partners worldwide. Since its beginning, the group has organized more than 250 events worldwide, involving more than 5.000 artists, in more than 60 international venues in Italy, the USA, Canada, the UK, Spain, France, etc. Most of the last events have been realized in museums (CCCB – Centre de Cultura Contemporània de Barcelona in Spain, NCCA – National Center for Contemporary Arts in Moscow, etc.), galleries and private foundations.

ITSLIQUID is based on fluidity, motion, connection and accessibility. Making things easy to do. Welcome.