Sergio Zevallos wins the illy SustainArt Prize at ARCOmadrid 2015

The eighth edition of the award recognizes the project Callejón Oscuro, 2014 from the artist Sergio Zevallos, presented in the gallery 80m2 Livia Benavides at the #SoloProjects section

Madrid, 26th February 2014. Sergio Zevallos, artist participating in the #SoloProjects section with the gallery 80m2 Livia Benavides, was proclaimed winner of the eighth edition of the illy SustainArt Prize this afternoon at ARCO 2015 for his work Callejón Oscuro, awarded with € 15,000 by illycaffè.

The jury, formed by Cuauhtémoc Medina, chief curator at MUAC University Museum of Contemporary Art-UNAM at Mexico DF; João Fernandes, Deputy Director of Conservation, Research and Dissemination of the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía and Carlo Bach, art director of illycaffè, have highlighted the work of Zevallos his willingness to put on stage and to debate about a set of lifestyles and sexual identities that have been expelled from the public, persecuted and ridiculed. His work is a response to the conflict situation experienced in Peru in the eighties, a reading of the social, urban, space and body control, pointing to a Queer body as a matter of zoning for the way that unites the storytelling and conceptual plot with a practice of self-representation. Zevallos began his career in Peru in the eighties working in the parallel circuits of the official art spaces. His visibility as an artist has always been limited and therefore the illy SustainArt Award is an important recognition for his work.

In this eighth edition of illy Sustain Art Prize at ARCO, and the fourth dedicated to the #SoloProjects program, the work of Zevallos is part of one of the subject areas represented this year in this section, the one referring to Performativity of gender and research practices in Latin America.

The illy SustainArt Prize aims to provide visibility and networking opportunities in www.illySustainArt.org online platform and recognize the winning artist with a cash prize of 15,000 euros. The award was created with the aim of spreading the company's approach to sustainable growth in the international art community, offering opportunities for visibility in the marketplace and exchange of artists from emerging countries.

The illy SustainArt ARCOmadrid Award was established in 2008, recognizing in its first edition the young Brazilian artist Matheus Rocha Pitta. In its second edition, in 2009, the prize was awarded to Avinash Veeraraghavan, one of the emerging young talent in India. The 2010 recognized the Mexican artist Camilo Ontiveros, and in 2011, back to a Brazilian artist, the young André Komatsu. In 2012, the award went to Chilean artist Voluspa Jarpa; in 2013 was the artist couple Julia Rometti & Victor Costales who received the award for his book "Anarchism Magic" and in its latest edition the award recognized the Argentine artist Diego Bruno for his work "Location".


illy SustainArt
The illy SustainArt Prize was founded in 2007 with the aim of deepening the dimension of the actions of illycaffè to the world of contemporary art and expand the international artistic community enterprise approach to sustainable growth. The core of the project is www.illysustainArt.org digital platform, open to the world of contemporary art that wants to become a cultural meeting point of reference for the exchange of artists and curators from emerging countries showcase. In the digital platform, artists have the opportunity to show their work to a panel of recognized experts in international art as Meskerem Assegued, Carlo Bach, Carlos Basualdo, Suman Gopinath, Gerardo Mosquera, Michelangelo Pistoletto, Mariangela Mendez Prencke, and Angela Vettese.

illycaffè, with headquarters in Trieste, produces and markets a unique blend of espresso coffee and is the leading brand in the high-end segment of the coffee market. illycaffè is the official partner of Expo 2015 and it takes charge of the content project and management, the exhibitions and the events associated to coffee, in the Coffee Cluster common area. More than 6 million cups of illy espresso coffee are enjoyed every day. Sold in more than 140 countries around the world, illy is available in more than 100,000 of the world’s best restaurants and cafés. espressamente illy, the Italian-style coffee franchising chain, is present with 230 outlets in more than 30 countries to date. To grow and spread the culture of coffee, the company has established Coffee University, a center of excellence that offers full training in all aspects of coffee theory and practice to growers, baristas and coffee lovers. Globally, the company employs around 1,050 people and, in 2013, recorded consolidated sales of € 373.9 million. illycaffé buys green coffee directly from growers of the best Arabica through partnerships based on sustainable development. Working with the best growers in the world – in Brazil, Central America, India, Africa and China – the Trieste-based company develops long-term relationships that transfer know-how and technology to growers while paying above the market rate for their production.