Awards and arts prize winners – quick links
British Art Prize
This year’s British Art Prize attracted thousands of entries from the United Kingdrom and beyond, across a broad range of styles, mediums and subject matter. First prize went to Christopher James for Abandoned Next, a stunning painting of a bird’s nest with eggs.
Victor Harris took second prize for his large-scale painting of the model at his regular life-drawing class, while third prize went to Michele Ashby for a wintry self-portrait. Rebecca Holton won the Raw Umber Prize for Portraiture for her painting Flat White.
All the shortlisted works, including the winners, can be viewed and purchased.
Royal Institute of Oil Painters Awards
Nia Mackeown received the Lady of the Chateau Award for her painting Studio Sill with Bottles in this year’s Royal Institute of Oil Painters Awards. The Lady of the Chateau Award is awarded to a work that reveals the world through a luminous, deeply personal lens.
Mackeown’s prize includes a place in the immersive painting workshops at Château de Puy Vidal in southwest France.
Aurelijus Kovaliovas won The Fred Beckett Memorial Artist Award with his painting Unwanted Messages. The £4,000 Roger Remington Award for an outstanding painting went to Wendy Barratt for her portrait, Peter.
Digital Artist of the Future
Arts collective DYSPLA is the winner of Saatchi Gallery’s inaugural Digital Artist of the Future Prize. The collective received a £10,000 prize comprising £5,000 cash and a £5,000 media package.
With innovation as its theme, the prize highlights artists who push the possibilities of digital art, challenge convention, and invite audiences to see creativity through fresh perspectives. The winning work is on display at Saatchi Gallery along with all the shortlisted works until 11 January 2026.
Waterstones Books of the Year
Leading bookseller Waterstones has named three debut novels as its Irish, Scottish and Welsh books of the year for 2025. Wendy Erskine’s The Benefactors (Hodder & Stoughton) is the winner for Ireland; Tom Newlands’ Only Here, Only Now (Orion) is the winner for Scotland; and Anthony Shapland’s A Room Above a Shop (Granta) wins the Welsh prize.
The awards began in 2012 and specifically champion books by authors based in, or titles with a strong setting in, Ireland, Scotland, and Wales.
Discerning Eye Prize
The Discerning Eye Prize received more than 6,500 entries from artists across the UK this year. The Purchase Prize, worth £5,000, went to Victoria Sills for her oil on wood painting Alice.
The judges commended Sills’ meticulously detailed work, which measures only twelve by twelve centimetres, commenting that it epitomises the prize’s ethos that size does not equal artistic merit.
The works in the Discerning Eye Prize exhibition are available to view and purchase online to 1 January 2026.
Future Makers
Grime artists GeeOne and Zachariyah Sol are the winners of Future Makers 2025. They were chosen by music industry judges at a performance at the Royal Albert Hall. The London-based duo, aged 17 and 18, performed their original song Better Than at the Future Makers final.
The competition and development program is run by RAH and encourages young musicians from across the UK to apply with their original material.
GeeOne (real name Jentai) and Zachariyah will now receive support from the RAH and its partners throughout 2026 to launch their careers in the music industry, including through a headline performance in the hall’s 200-capacity Elgar Room, plus a slot at an external music festival, studio time with a top producer and assistance with marketing and PR campaigns.
More than 300 acts submitted audition tapes for Future Makers 2025 with nine acts going through to the final.
Sky Arts Portrait Artist of the Year
Chloe Barnes is the winner of the Sky Arts’ series Portrait Artist of the Year. Her winning work was a double portrait of ‘national treasure’ Mary Berry and her dog Freddie in a teal monochrome on aluminium.
Barnes wins a £10,000 commission to create a portrait of award-winning mathematician and broadcaster Professor Hannah Fry for the Royal Society.
Barnes is a London-based artist who creates figurative monotypes exploring identity and female experience. She was one of 72 artists who took part in series twelve of Sky Arts’ Portrait Artist of the Year. Works by semi-finalists are exhibited at Noho Showroom in London until 21 December.
Opportunities
Herbert Smith Freehills Kramer Portrait Award
Entries are now open for the Herbert Smith Freehills Kramer Portrait Award. The award showcases a variety of approaches to portraiture to show the enduring relevance of portraiture today. This highly competitive and prestigious international competition is open to artists 18 and over. It comes with a first prize of £35,000 and the deadline is 6 January 2026.
Royal Society of British Artists Annual Exhibition
Artists from the UK and around the world are invited to submit work for exhibition alongside members of the Royal Society of British Artists at their 2026 Annual Exhibition to be held at Mall Galleries. Works of painting, sculpture, printmaking and drawing are eligible, with prizes and awards worth over £20,000. The deadline is 9 January 2026.
Derwent Art Prize
The eighth edition of the Derwent Art Prize is open for entries until 13 January 2026. With a prize pool of £13,500, the Derwent Art Prize celebrates contemporary graphic art, and invites artists to submit two- and three-dimensional artworks created in any pencil medium, including colour, water-soluble, pastel, graphite and charcoal. Selected works will be shown in an exhibition at London’s OXO Gallery.
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