Cura Award
The Cura Award is given each year at the Sarasota Art Museum’s annual Gala. Cura, derived from the latin word curare, meaning to care, is fixed at the core of our mission and values. Cura gives us curate, curator, and curatorial, which define the central work of an art museum. Cura gives us curiosity, which is what we hope to cultivate in ourselves and all who engage with the Museum. Cura gives us care-what our community does here in Sarasota and around the world. We care for art.
The Cura Award Design
Neuroscience tells us that working with our hands stimulates our brain and inspires our creativity. The movement not only allows a clarity and depth of thought, the plasticity of our brain allows us to shape ourselves through the process of sensory touch and movement. The Cura award is an object of contemplation, designed not to be gazed upon, but to be handled, touched, played with. The wood is pinus palustri, centuries-old heart pine sourced from the joists of the Sarasota High School, and shaped by Dan Greenberg, a Dutch woodworker based in Micanopy, Florida. The sphere is a work in progress, and will continue to be “finished” as you use it. The natural oils in your hands will give the object a lustrous patina after years of loving contemplation that will become more beautiful over time.
2019 Award Recipient
We are honored to present the inaugural Cura Award to Dr. Lowery Stokes Sims for a lifetime of caring for art, caring for artists, caring for our global community, and caring for those who will follow us and pick up the stewardship of the objects of our collective memory, which will forever bind us together.