“Riot glass” bowls win art prize

AN MMU student has won a prestigious art prize worth £1,000.

Ana Rosa Hopkins, who is currently working towards a PhD by Practice at MIRIAD, won the neo:artprize 2012 with her collection of bowls made from broken glass collected following the riots in August last year.

The sculptor, whose forthcoming exhibitions include three in Portugal and one at Manchester’s Rogue Studios, said: “I was very happy to win the neo:artprize 2012. There were more than 400 entries and the judges told me that the competion was very strong.”

Cultural catalyst

Ana was born in Cordoba, Argentina, and lived in Brazil for more than 15 years, where she worked as an arts consultant for the British Council and set up her own cultural management company creating and producing a range of cultural activities.

She is now based in Manchester where her research explores how an object’s ‘back story’, can act as a catalyst to communicate and generate meaning through metaphor and signification, association and suggestion. For the last five years she has specialised in the use of glass, mirror glass and lenses.