Brendan Gill Prize 2010: Call for Nominations
June 1st, 2010
We invite MAS members and friends to submit nominations for the 2010 Brendan Gill Prize. The prize, endowed to permit a cash award, is given annually to the creator of a specific work— a book, essay, musical composition, play, painting, sculpture, architectural design, film or choreographic work — completed between January 2009 and July 2010 that best captures the spirit and energy of New York City. The award is not intended to honor a lifetime achievement. Please submit nominations to MAS by July 9. To download a nomination form click here.
Past Brendan Gill Prize recipients have included: artists Mike and Doug Starn for their site specific installation See it split, see it change; musician Sufjan Stevens for his musical The BQE, actress Sarah Jones for her play Bridge & Tunnel, and artists Jeanne-Claude and Christo for their temporary Central Park art installation The Gates. For more information about the Brendan Gill Prize, visit MAS.org/brendan-gill or call 212-935-3960.






MAS started out the month with the opening of the exhibit Re-Imagining Cities: Urban Design After the Age of Oil on October 1. It is co-sponsored by PennDesign and on view in our galleries through December 4, 2009. Click
Singer-songwriter Sufjan Stevens will receive the Municipal Art Society’s 2008 Brendan Gill Prize this Saturday, September 27, at the Brooklyn Academy of Music for his multi-media musical composition, The BQE. His “symphonic and cinematic exploration of New York City’s infamous Brooklyn-Queens Expressway” was selected by the Brendan Gill jury for “capturing the energy, vigor, and verve of our incomparable city.” We are thrilled to invite MAS Members to join us this Saturday and meet Mr. Stevens at the Brooklyn Academy of Music.
The 2007 Brendan Gill Prize was awarded on Monday evening, December 3, to actor, playwright and poet Sarah Jones, for her Tony-award winning one-woman show “Bridge & Tunnel.” The newly built Diker Pavilion in the National Museum of the American Indian, a transformed landmark — formerly the U.S. Custom House built by the legendary Beaux-Arts architect Cass Gilbert — on Bowling Green, was the stage for the presentation.
The 2006 Brendan Gill Prize has honored Christo and Jeanne-Claude for The Gates — the first grand scale public art project of the 21st century, a one-time exhibition that inspired New Yorkers and the rest of the world to exultation and goodwill. For sixteen shining days, February 12-28, 2005, the billowing saffron of The Gates metamorphosed Central Park into a museum without walls.