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It(Turner Prize) was established in 1984 to celebrate new developments in contemporary art and is given to a British artist under 50 who judges believe has put on the best exhibition of the last 12 months.

http://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-30281175

I couldn't understand the structure of relative clause,which was highligted, in the sentence. Was the word judge used as noun or verb? If it is noun I think it should/could have been written in passive voice like

" ...who is/has been believed to have put on the best exhibition of the last 12 months by judges"

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    It's true that it could have been written that way. But I don't think it should have. Your formulation puts by judges very far away from believed and it could then be interpreted as modifying exhibition. An alternate might be: ... artist under 50 who is believed by judges to have put on the best exhibition... But I think the original is OK and the only thing I might do to it is to put a the in front of judges simply to eliminate the noun/verb question at that point: who the judges believe has... – Jim Dec 1 '14 at 21:20
  • Sorry I didn't ask initially but is it normal to merge two sentences in one relative clause.Because I have been taught that there could be a noun or pronoun in a relative clause.But here "who" is both noun and pronoun or just does it seem to me like that? Can we call this structure as simply relative clause or is there another grammatical name available?I dont know if my question is clear? – Mrt Dec 1 '14 at 21:44
  • interpretation could have been helped by a couple of commas… …"who, judges believe, has put…" I wouldn't necessarily use them in the final sentence, but just as an aid to breaking the intended meaning down. – Tetsujin Dec 2 '14 at 7:55
  • You already got two passive clauses in that sentence; adding a third might have the effect of putting the reader asleep. – user6951 Dec 2 '14 at 11:41
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If we break it up, it becomes more clear.

The Turner Prize was established in 1984 to celebrate new developments in contemporary art.

The Turner Prize is given to a British artist under 50.

The Turner Prize is given by judges.

The judges believe the artist has put on the best exhibition of the last 12 months.

So, "judges" is clearly a noun. The sentence is awkward and could have been made more clear.

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...and is given to a British artist under 50 who judges believe has put on the best exhibition of the last 12 months.

It can be simplified as:

...Judges believe that he has put on the best exhibition...

Believe can relate to judges but it can't relate to Turner Prize because it should be believes.

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  • Sorry I didn't ask initially but is it normal to merge two sentences in one relative clause.Because I have been taught that there could be a noun or pronoun in a relative clause.But here "who" is both noun and pronoun or just does it seem to me like that? Can we call this structure as simply relative clause or is there another grammatical name available?I dont know if my question is clear? – Mrt Dec 1 '14 at 21:45
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    Relativization can move the relative pronoun from arbitrarily far down the subordinate clause chain; in this case it relativized the subject of has put on from the clause judges believe (that) Subject has put on the best exhibition. That Subject becomes the relative pronoun who in who judges believe has put on the best exhibition. Relative clause formation is a well-understood rule. – John Lawler Dec 1 '14 at 22:22

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