Juan Ford's practice has consistently been engaged with opening up new possibilities for realism in painting. He has employed many strategies, which argue around the theoretical 'problems' of realism in painting. He enjoys exploiting the limited shortcomings of the dull, officially sanctioned dialogue between painting and its would-be executioner, photography, in order to develop new potentials for realism. Consequently his work evolves and varies with every exhibition.
Juan Ford was awarded a BA with 1st class honours in 1998 and completed his MA in 2001, both at RMIT. He has been the recipient of a number of grants and prizes including a 2005 Australia Council Studio Residency in Rome, the prestigious Fletcher Jones Art Award, and the Conrad Jupiters Art Prize. He won the People’s Choice prize in 2004 for both the ABN Amro Emerging Artist Art Prize and the Salon des Reuses. Ford has also been included in a number of important group and survey exhibitions including Galcier: Contemporary Painting, which toured Australia from 2001 to 2003. In 2010 Ford won the Basil Sellers Art Prize, People’s Choice Award and was a finalist in the Wynne Prize at the Art Gallery of New South Wales amongst other important prizes.
