The 2017 Woollahra Small Sculpture Prize – Australia’s pre-eminent national award for small sculpture – has been awarded to Melbourne artist Sanné Mestrom. Ms. Mestrom has been awarded the $20,000 acquisitive main prize for her work, Sleeping Muse, a four-kilogram bronze sculpture of the artist’s head that has been knocked around and chewed on by Mestrom’s dog.

675 entries were submitted to the Prize this year, the second highest number of entries in prize history, with Ms. Mestrom’s sculpture being one of a selection of 47 finalists. The judging panel for the 17th annual Prize was comprised of curator, writer, artist, activist and first Indigenous judge for the Prize Djon Mundine, OAM, Executive Director, Artspace, Sydney and Curator, Encounters, Art Basel | Hong Kong Alexie Glass-Kantor, and gallerist and benefactor Roslyn Oxley, OAM.