THE architectural environment created by the security situation in Northern Ireland is a key subject in the work of Paul Seawright, surprise winner of this year's IMMA/Glen Dimplex Artists Award, which was announced at a ceremony in Dublin last night.
The £15,000 award was presented to Belfastborn Mr Seawright at a ceremony in the Irish Museum of Modern Art, Royal Hospital Kilmainham, by Mr Ciaran Benson, chairman of the Arts Council.
Mr Seawright was nominated for the award for his show, Police Force, a group of photographic works exploring aspects of the built environment of the RUC, from police stations to security huts and armoured vehicles.
To create the photographs, Mr Seawright was given unprecedented and unlimited access to the often unseen backstage spaces of RUC premises.
Mr Seawright's latest group of photographs uncover a world of startling grimness, and even squalor, behind the iron shutters and bulletproof glass of the Northern security force.
In his pictures, places normally occupied by RUC officers are seen as tawdry, desperate prisons, matched only in their harshness by the force's bleak detention cells.
Previous exhibitions by the artist include a show called The Orange Order and another entitled Sectarian Murder.
The clear favourite for this year's award was Corkborn sculptor Dorothy Cross, while a strong showing at the current exhibition was believed to be furthering the case of the team of Phelan and McLoughlin.
The other nominees were the minimalist painter, Willie McKeown, Maurice O'Connell, whose work is frequently site specific, and the Hamburg based Irish artist, Stephen Craig, whose recent work has taken the form of miniature architectural sculptures.
Each of the artists shortlisted for this fourth IMAA/Glen Dimplex award received a £1,000 fee.