After all the controversy, Turner prize goes to an artistic thinker

The Turner prize has had something of a topsy-turvy year. After years of tabloid controversy about the merits of its entries, the flurry of headlines this winter came not from outraged Fleet Street tabloid journalists but from the art world itself.

And the panel behind the most famous prize in modern art delivered another disappointment to the lurid last night by rejecting the most obviously outlandish piece, Arsewoman in Wonderland, in favour of the favourite, Keith Tyson, who takes his inspiration not from porn movies but from science.

Before the prize was presented, Sir Nicholas Serota said: "The Turner Prize gives us all a chance to see some of the best art being made in Britain. But I have to say to the artists, it does bring all kinds of unwanted pressures."

The 33-year-old artist, whose work includes scientific drawings and mathematical formulae, collected the £20,000 prize from the architect Daniel Libeskind at a ceremony at Tate Britain in London.

Receiving the cheque, Tyson wished a happy birthday to his grandmother, Edith, who was 87 yesterday. He said afterwards he had worked for five years as a shipbuilder in Barrow, adding: "I always wanted to be an artist, but in Cumbria you learn a trade first."

Asked about the comments by the Culture minister, Kim Howells, who described the shortlist as "conceptualist bullshit", Tyson said: "Everyone is entitled to their own opinions. But I thought some of the things he said were a little unfortunate and a bit sad ...I don't see any discrepancy between what is here [the Turner Prize exhibition] and the National Gallery."

Tyson added that Britain did not know what it had until it was gone. "If Damien Hirst were to go under a bus there would be national mourning," he said.

One of his prize-winning works was a giant black block humming with hidden computers which was inspired by Rodin's The Thinker. The judges said they "admired the way in which his work embraces the poetic, the logical, the humorous and the fantastical and draws connections between them".

His rivals included Fiona Banner's retelling of a pornographic film in shocking pink letters, and Catherine Yass's video of an 800ft descent down a skyscraper in a mist-bound Canary Wharf in London. Liam Gillick's entry comprised various drawings including a design for an airport, all displayed under a glowing Perspex roof.

But Tyson's victory came in a year when the prize went beyond its usual controversy and drew criticism from the contemporary art establishment. While the chairman of the Turner judges, Sir Nicholas Serota, will have been untroubled by Mr Howells's comments, he will not have appreciated criticisms from two of his friends and contemporary art icons, the collector Charles Saatchi and the artist Tracey Emin.

Mr Saatchi dismissed its latest shortlist as "pseudo-controversial rehashed claptrap". He said he could not understand why a series of 24 ethnographic sculptures holding McDonald's food by the British brothers Jake and Dinos Chapman ­ for which he paid £1m ­ was passed over by the judges.

Emin, who was shortlisted in 1999, claimed in The Independent last week that the judging process was fatally flawed by compromise voting and favouritism. "I believed it was done by democratic vote and that anyone could win," she said. "The artists who are nominated believe it, the public believes it, but it's not true."

The judges said in a statement last night that they "stressed the strength of the shortlist and wished to record their admiration for the outstanding presentations produced by all four artists".

The prize, sponsored by Channel 4, has more commonly come in for criticism for the standard of its entries. It was set up in 1984 by the Patrons of the New Art, a group of rich contemporary art enthusiasts who wanted to introduce new art to a wider public. In 1991it was rejuvenated under Channel 4 sponsorship, the prize money was doubled and the age limit set at 50. In 1993, the art pranksters the K Foundation set up a counter-award for Worst Artist with prize money of £40,000. Rachel Whiteread won both prizes and gave the K Foundation money to charity.

Media interest in the award reached a peak in 1995, when Damien Hirst won with his preserved sheep. One of the exhibits that failed to get on the 1997 list was entitled Work of Living Art ­ involving the former tramp Roger Powell, who was paid by the advertising millionaire Tony Kaye to wander around art galleries talking about being homeless. Criticism of the prize resurfaced in the same year when Julian Opie, an installation artist, said he had turned down a place on the shortlist because the prize had become a publicity stunt.

This year, in awarding Tyson the prize, the jury praised "the strong visual energy of his work across a wide range of media including drawing, painting, sculpture and installation". They "particularly noted the continuing progression in his work evident in his presentation for the Turner prize exhibition". Tyson was the only artist on the shortlist not to have studied at Goldsmith's, the London art college that produced Hirst, Whiteread and another winner, Chris Ofili.

He was born in Ulverston, Cumbria, in 1969. After completing a course in mechanical engineering craft studies (MECS), he studied fine art at Carlisle College of Art from 1989-90 and completed an MA in alternative practice at the University of Brighton in 1993. He lives in Brighton.

His art is characterised by his fascination with philosophical theories. His explorations often manifest themselves in complex drawings ­ transcriptions of the artist's mental activity described by the curator of the Photographers' Gallery in London, Kate Bush, as adding up to a "drawn repository of the myriad things ­ ideas, experiences, feelings ­ flowing in and out of one individual brain".

PREVIOUS WINNERS

1984 Malcolm Morley Painter with conceptual foundation.

1985 Howard Hodgkin. Painter who hovers between abstraction and representation.

1986 Gilbert and George. Much work is highly coloured photographic art.

1987 Richard Deacon Sculptor using wood and metal to "organic" forms.

1988 Tony Cragg Sculptor using "found" materials including plastic.

1989 Richard Long Known for environmental work using slate and chalk and picture for opening of Tate Modern

1990 Prize suspended

1991 Anish Kapoor Sculptor whose highly coloured work addresses spiritual notions.

1992 Grenville Davey Sculptor who creates withe broad range of materials.

1993 Rachel Whiteread Most famous for solid-concrete Victorian terrace house.

1994 Antony Gormley Sculptor. Most famous for Angel of the North, Gateshead.

1995 Damien Hirst His most famous work 'Mother and Child Divided' had four tanks containing parts of a severed cow and calf in formaldehyde

1996 Douglas Gordon Film-maker best known for "24-Hour Psycho" film showing Hitchcock movie in slow motion.

1997 Gillian Wearing Won for quirky films and photographs.

1998 Chris Ofili. Work included portrait of Virgin Mary made with elephant dung.

1999 Steve McQueen Beat Tracey Emin's unmade bed with film of a tape recorder

2000 Wolfgang Tillmans First still photographer to receive award

2001 Martin Creed Won for empty gallery space with the lights switching on and off.