Bad art in Australia

Helen Round from the Museum of Particularly Bad Art in Melbourne tries her best to replicate the content of a painting which is one of 44 entries in this year’s Itchyball Prize for bad art – a play on the Archibald Prize, Australia’s top award for portrait painting. The selection criteria for the competition are that an artwork is completely devoid of technical skill, unusual, poor or tasteless subject matter (preferably all three), and an instinctual feeling that the art piece is poor. Ms Round said it would be difficult for the 2010 entries to match the awfulness of previous years, but bad art could always plumb new depths.