Announcing the Winner of the 2024 SCHULMAN AND BULLARD ARTICLE PRIZE

Shaun Midanik (doctoral candidate in the Department of Art at the University of Toronto) has been awarded the 2024 Schulman and Bullard Article Prize. Now in its tenth year, this award is given by the Association of Print Scholars (APS) to an article published by an early-career scholar that features compelling and innovative research on prints or printmaking. Midanik’s essay, “Picture Bound: Customized Books of Prints and the Myth of the Ideal Series,” was published in Customised Books in Early Modern Europe and the Americas, 1400-1700, a volume edited by Walter Melion and Christopher Fletcher. 

In his essay, Midanik scrutinizes early modern bound books of prints and some of the typical ways that makers and users customized them. One juror noted, “The author astutely emphasizes the materiality of the individual book (the content and whether it is bound or unbound, pasted into an album, etc.), which more accurately represents the production and interaction with the buyer, and should assume precedence over a theoretical ideal or finished book.” Another juror praised Midanik’s use of close material analysis and reception studies, noting that his essay “makes a strong, convincing case for considering the conditions of customization as central parts of the history of books of prints. Midanik deftly weaves pointed examples and substantial conclusions throughout the text.” Midanik’s publication asserts the importance of images in bound books and proposes new approaches to interpreting them, making his essay relevant to curators, conservators, collectors, and print scholars of any time period.

APS would like to acknowledge and thank this year’s jurors for their diligence and generosity in reading the submissions: Rebecca Capua (Conservator in the Paper Conservation Department at the Metropolitan Museum of Art); Sarah Schaefer (Associate Professor of Art History at the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee); and Joyce Zelen (Curator of Prints at the Rijksmuseum).

The Schulman and Bullard Article Prize, which carries a $2,000 award, is generously sponsored by Susan Schulman and Carolyn Bullard and celebrates innovative contributions by early-career scholars to the field. Following the mission of APS, articles submitted for the prize can focus on printmaking across any geographic region and all chronological periods. APS is currently accepting submissions for the 2025 prize, the deadline for which is January 31, 2025. Please visit the APS website for more details about submitting an article for consideration: https://printscholars.org/awards/