Aesthetica Art Prize 2025
Aesthetica Art Prize 2025
19 September 2025 – 25 January 2026 | Included in general admission
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The Aesthetica Art Prize returns to York Art Gallery from 19 September 2025 – 25 January 2026. Celebrating its 19th anniversary, the Prize supports the work and creativity of a wide range of incredible contemporary artists, all working across different art forms and attracting national and international attention and prestige.
25 of the shortlisted works, ranging from paintings and sculpture to photography and digital art forms, will be displayed at York Art Gallery this autumn. Recognised by Jonathan Jones, art critic for The Guardian, as one of the top five exhibitions of the season in 2024, this year’s show continues to make a powerful contribution to contemporary cultural conversations and shape the future of artistic practice.
The Aesthetica Art Prize captures the diverse range of materials and media used by artists in the 21st century. Many of the pieces featured focus on themes of identity, culture and place in a global context. These include artist Àsìkò’s focus on migration and cultural memory in his series New World Giants, Hussina Raja’s STATION, an exploration of South Asian and Caribbean cultures in the London landscape, as well as The Object, Pen with Tattoo, The Portrait and The Vinyl, an audiovisual installation by Joanne Coates (UK House of Commons Election Artist for 2024) depicting working-class landscapes in the rural Northeast of England. Jarman Award-shortlisted Morgan Quaintance presents Surviving You, Always, a layered, emotional film reflecting on adolescence, class and the human condition in London. Rayvenn D’Clark’s sculptural piece, Untitled, challenges historical depictions of Black anatomy in a large silicone structure using abstract lines to assert a new visual vocabulary. Through myth, archival research, and sculpture, art transforms ancestral memory into new legacies for the present and future.
Other works, like Vlad Hyrnko’s Foundation, experiment with light, structure and form, pushing the possibilities of still life in a digital context. Brendan Dawes, shortlisted for an Academy Award, presents Nothing Can Ever Be The Same, a 168-hour real-time generative film, commissioned by Venice Biennale Musica. Many of the featured artists find inspiration in the challenges and experiences of modern life. Time Pops Like Chewing Gum, a collaborative piece by Adam Cain, Lois Macdonald, and Princess Arinola Adegbite, explores love, disconnection, and the influence of technology and Artificial Intelligence in the 21st century. Bart Nelissen’s Datascapes, a series of digitally manipulated photographs, considers abstraction, technology, and the human urge to rationalise the natural world through pattern recognition. Similarly, Seascapes Triptych by Ellie Davies and Supernatural by Liz Miller Kovacs look at climate change, ecological fragility, and the relationship between land and the body through the same medium of digital photography.
Find out more: Aesthetica Art Prize 2025 Shortlist on Vimeo
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