Artes Mundi, the UK’s biggest art prize for contemporary art, has announced the shortlist for its biennial 11th edition, which will be presented at multiple venues across Wales for the second time.
The six nominees for the £40,000 prize are the Palestinian-Canadian artist Jumana Emil Abboud; Zambian-born Anawana Haloba; the Peruvian artist Antonio Paucar; the Californian artist Kameelah Janan Rasheed; Sacintya Mohini Simpson of Australia and the Myanmar-born artist Sawangwongse Yawnghwe. The Bagri Foundation, a UK charity which supported the last edition, is also backing Artes Mundi 11.
An exhibition of the selected artists will open at the National Museum Cardiff in October 2025, with the winner announced early 2026. For the tenth edition last year, Artes Mundi adopted a new exhibition format, expanding across Wales to venues such as Oriel Davies Gallery, Newtown, and Glynn Vivian Art Gallery in Swansea.
The same venues will participate in the next edition alongside Aberystwyth Arts Centre which is taking part for the first time. “The difference this time, as opposed to the last edition, is that all the artists can be seen together at the National Museum as well,” says a spokesperson.
The 11th edition’s jury includes Zoe Butt, the former artistic director of Ho Chi Minh City’s Factory Contemporary Arts Centre, who also judged the last edition; Sohrab Mohebbi, the director of SculptureCenter in New York and Marie Helene Pereira, the senior curator (performative practices) at Haus der Kulturen der Welt in Berlin.
The panel says in a statement: “Considering the fractious global politics we currently face, the jury noted particular strength in the selected artists’ stories, experiences and inherited memories as timely and necessary in this world that lives within a fear of difference.”
The winner of Artes Mundi 10 was Taloi Havini who comes from Bougainville in Papua New Guinea.