It might have been Archibald season, but this past month has also seen the announcement of the Ravenswood Art Prize, the First Nations Arts and Culture Awards, the Melbourne Design Week Award and a major commission for Edith Cowan University.
Latest arts prize winners – quick links
Monica Rani Rudhar wins Ravenswood Art Prize
Monica Rani Rudhar is the winner of the main $35,000 professional artists category in the 2026 Ravenswood Australian Women Art Prize.
The Sydney-based artist was selected for her ceramic artwork When both shall meet, which judge Jade Oakley described as ‘a refreshingly unique connection to cultural heritage and an exciting, contemporary artwork’.
Oakley added, ‘We were impressed with Rudhar’s overscaled representation of traditional Indian jewellery as a monument to cultural identity and the intimacy of love between mother and daughter, husband and wife.’
Jane Burton Taylor won the emerging artist prize and Stephanie Bush won the Indigenous Emerging Artist Prize. Both emerging prizes are worth $7500.
Established by Ravenswood School for Girls in 2017, the high value prize is designed to recognise, encourage and promote women in the visual arts. This year there were 1750 entrants.
Angela Goh named Experimental Performance Fellow
Dancer and choreographer Angela Goh is the recipient of Performance Space’s Experimental Performance Fellowship for 2026.
During the fellowship, Goh will undertake a year-long, self-directed program of research and development.
Her past work has been commissioned and presented by institutions including the Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney Opera House, National Gallery of Victoria and Museum of Contemporary Art Australia. Internationally, she’s worked with Seoul’s Leeum Museum of Art and Munich’s Haus der Kunst, among others, and is currently creating newly commissioned works for the 16th Gwangju Biennale and the 18th Lyon Biennale of Contemporary Art.
The Experimental Performance Fellowship is designed for New South Wales-based artists and collectives whose work engages deeply with their contemporary social, cultural, political, environmental, geographic, economic or technological contexts. It’s designed to support artists to take risks, with the aim of making a significant contribution to experimental performance in Australia and the Asia-Pacific.
Jon Goulder wins Melbourne Design Week Award
Fourth-generation Australian furniture designer and maker Jon Goulder has won the $10,000 Melbourne Design Week Award.
The award recognises Goulder’s ongoing contribution to the Australian design landscape, and honours a three-decade practice that has seen him working across seating, surfaces, cabinetry, lighting, textiles and objects. Working as a designer-maker, he is known for his mastery of craft, especially woodwork and leatherwork.
NGV Director Tony Ellwood AM said: ‘In our fast-paced, mass-produced world, Jon Goulder’s practice demonstrates a slower mode of making that celebrates materiality, inter-generational skills and the hand-made.’
Goulder said winning the award was ‘deeply meaningful’ on a personal level. ‘It’s recognition from my peers, and considering the calibre of past winners, it places the work within a respected lineage,’ he said. ‘It reinforces a sense of relevance – both in terms of the ideas I’m pursuing and the way I choose to work – and gives me confidence that this approach continues to resonate.’
Goulder’s work was recently showcased at 2026 Melbourne Design Week events at Chapter House, Abbotsford Convent and restaurant Yiaga.
Beau Dean Riley Smith receives Shaun Parker Fellowship
Wiradjuri and Gamillaraay man Beau Dean Riley Smith, an award-winning dancer, choreographer and actor, was named the inaugural recipient of a new – and very high value – fellowship.
The Shaun Parker & Company Choreographic Fellowship is worth $100,000 per year, with Riley Smith supported for two to three years, depending on how long his new work takes to develop.
Known for his work with Bangarra Dance Company, Riley Smith is now working on miyagan, which is expected to premiere in early 2028.
The new fellowship is supported by New York’s Denise and Michael Kellen Foundation.
ArtsHub: $100,000 dance fellowship announced by Shaun Parker & Company
Sarah Contos awarded CAP Grant Commission
Artist Sarah Contos is the recipient of the 2027 Copyright Agency Partnerships Grant Commission. The commissioned work will be developed for exhibition at Edith Cowan University’s City Campus public gallery in early 2027.
Contos, now based in Sydney, is a graduate of the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts. ECU’s announcement said her proposal ‘stood out for its meaningful connection to Western Australia and its compelling sense of nostalgia’.
Contos said it was a meaningful commission. ‘Having grown up in Perth, this exhibition is like a love letter to the city where many memories are held within its landscape, both intimate and collectively shared,’ she said. ‘I’m so excited to present the work being made for ECU Gallery, it’s going to be epic and something very special.’
A past winner of the Ramsey Art Prize, Contos’ two-decade career includes collaborations in performance, costume and stage design, alongside a strong exhibition history at major Australian institutions.
ECU Manager Art, Culture and Collections Clothilde Bullen OAM said Contos’ practice was renowned for its intuitive rigour. ‘It is a privilege to be able to work with Sarah on this beautifully conceived idea around nostalgia and memory, particularly related to our isolated city,’ she said.
The exhibition in February 2027 will be the first solo presentation of Contos’ work in Western Australia.
First Nations Arts and Culture Awards
The First Nations Arts and Culture Awards recognise veteran artists and arts workers. This year, artist Bronwyn Bancroft and musician Stephen Pigram won the Red Ochre Award for Lifetime Achievement in Artistic Excellence, while curator Hetti Perkins and artist and cultural leader Djambawa Marawili AM won the Red Ochre Award for Lifetime Achievement in Cultural Advocacy and Leadership.
ArtsHub: Bronwyn Bancroft and Hettie Perkins in First Nations Arts Awards
Stanislava Pinchuk awarded Rome fellowship
Artist Stanislava Pinchuk is the recipient of the 2026 Mordant Family and Creative Australia Affiliated Fellowship at the American Academy in Rome.
The fellowship is for two to three months, and is worth between $8500 and $12,500 depending on the length of the stay. It’s designed to support established artists undertaking ambitious new work, providing time and space within one of the world’s most significant creative and intellectual communities.
Pinchuk said she was honoured to receive the fellowship, which she would use ‘to begin localised research and production works, and embrace the challenge of examining Roman posthomerica in such a dynamic and thorough academic environment’.
The Director of the American Academy in Rome, Aliza Wong, said: ‘We look forward to Stanislava bringing her extraordinary practice in data-mapping and conflict topographies into dialogue with Rome’s rich historical and intellectual landscape.’
Past recipients of the fellowship include Lynne Roberts-Goodwin, Jenny Watson, Alex Seton, Barbara Campbell, Reko Rennie, Angela Valamanesh, Khaled Sabsabi and Sally Smart.
Back to Back Theatre a Portrait artist at French festival
Geelong’s Back to Back Theatre, led by an ensemble of actors who identify as having an intellectual disability or as neurodivergent, has been selected as the Portrait artist for the 2026 Festival d’Automne à Paris.
The in-depth look means visitors will get a chance to see multiple works by the groundbreaking theatre company, including Ganesh Versus the Third Reich, which will also be performed in Melbourne from 17 to 19 June ahead of its Paris season.
ArtsHub: Back to Back Theatre recognised as ‘a singular artistic voice’
Fiona Longhurst retrospective charts a three-decade practice
Arts Project Australia is currently presenting a three decade retrospective of the work of Fiona Longhurst at its Melbourne gallery.
Longhurst has worked at the APA studio since 1991, developing a distinctive visual language defined by layered compositions, dense mark-making and intuitive structure. Drawing memory rather than direct observation, her studio practice is always evolving but often features repetition.
Now 75, Longhurst is an artist with Down syndrome whose life and practice reflect significant shifts in how artists with intellectual disability are supported and recognised in Australia.
‘I like colours,’ Longhurst says of her practice. ‘Beautiful yellow, orange, and pink. Mauve and grey. Blue and green. Flowers and gardens. A blue rose. Leaves, squares, the sun. Writing in colours.’
APA Director Liz Nowell says the retrospective marks a significant milestone for Longhurst: ‘Fiona has developed a singular and recognisable visual language over decades. This exhibition brings her achievement into sharp focus while exemplifying Arts Project Australia’s vision to champion neurodivergent artists and artists with intellectual disability as leading voices in contemporary art.’
Coinciding with the exhibition, APA is also producing a monograph on Longhurst’s practice with Perimeter Editions, planned to as the first of a series of publications on APA artists over coming years.
Fiona Longhurst’s 5 7 3 Float Fall Petals 10 Trees is at the Arts Project Australia Gallery in Collingwood, Melbourne until 13 June.
Richard Lewer wins Archibald Prize
Melbourne-based artist Richard Lewer won the Archibald Prize for his portrait of senior artist and ngangkari (traditional healer) Iluwanti Ken.
Yolngu artist Gaypalani Waṉambi won the Wynne Prize and Lucy Culliton won the Sulman Prize.
ArtsHub: Richard Lewer wins 2026 Archibald Prize with portrait of Iluwanti Ken
Tarik Ahlip wins Blake Art Prize
The Blake Prize celebrates contemporary art and poetry that explores spirituality, belief and human experience. This years $35,000 prize went to Tarik Ahlip for On Her Return (Facial Burns and a Garland of Flowers) (2024-25), a sculptural piece created from plaster, pigment and sand.
Ahlip is based on Dharug and Gadigal Country and works across film, sculpture, installation, sound and text. Interested in moral frameworks and religious and philosophical traditions, his work often examines spirituality, ritual, migration and ethics through poetic and cinematic forms.
Drew Connor Holland won the people’s choice award for excerpts (hand) (2025) and Jennifer Kemarre Martiniello OAM won the $10,000 prize for Painted Desert Continuous Creation Story (2024), which will see her work entering the Liverpool Powerhouse collection.
The award exhibition continues at Liverpool Powerhouse in Sydney until 14 June.
Miles Franklin Literary Award reveals longlist
The 10 Australian novels longlisted for the $60,000 Miles Franklin Literary Award are:
- Discipline by Randa Abdel-Fattah (University of Queensland Press)
- I Want Everything by Dominic Amerena (Summit Books)
- Salt Upon the Water by Lyn Dickens (Wakefield Press)
- Tenderfoot by Toni Jordan (Hachette)
- First Name Second Name by Steve MinOn (University of Queensland Press)
- My Heart at Evening by Konrad Muller (Evercreech Editions)
- Fierceland by Omar Musa (Penguin Random House Australia)
- Little World by Josephine Rowe (Black Inc.)
- Elegy, Southwest by Madeleine Watts (Ultimo Press)
- You Must Remember This by Sean Wilson (Affirm Press)
The winner will be announced in August.
ArtsHub: 2026 Miles Franklin Literary Award longlist announced
Hadley’s Art Prize announces finalists
Mia Boe, Betty Muffler and Ken Done are among the 27 finalists in the $100,000 Hadley’s Art Prize for landscape artworks. There is no set medium for this prize, and the selected works span painting, printmaking, photography and works made from earth pigments and botanical inks.
Boe, an emerging artist with Butchulla and Burmese ancestry, was selected for That Which Persists, which shows flannel flowers – symbols of post-fire renewal – alongside spirit figures that represent the enduring connection between First Nations peoples and Country.
Betty Muffler, whose role as a ngangkaṟi (traditional healer) intertwines with her practice as a painter, was selected for Ngangkari Ngura (Healing Country), which depicts the act of healing itself.
The 27 finalists are:
- Kelsey Ashe
- Natasha Bieniek
- Mia Boe
- Joe Blundell
- Harrison Bowe
- Betty Campbell
- Brenda Croft
- Ken Done
- Robert Fielding
- Grace Gladdish
- Linda Greedy
- Miranda Hampson
- George Kennedy
- Melissa Kenihan
- Ann Lane
- Bronte Leighton-Dore
- Kim Leutwyler
- Alice Mannheim
- Julian Meagher
- Michelle Pulatuwayu
- Woody Minnapinni
- Betty Muffler
- Agnes Rubuntja
- Todd Simpson
- Imants Tillers
- Luke Wagner
- Bugai Whyoulter
- Philip Wolfhagen
The winner will be announced 31 July ahead of the exhibition of the finalists’ works at the Hadley’s Orient Hotel in Hobart from 1 to 23 August.
Artspace Studio Program welcomes new artists
Remy Faint, Rindon Johnson, Adriana Māhanga-Lear and Haji Oh have been welcomed to the 2026-28 Artspace Studio Program.
Selected through an open call, the artists will take part in Artspace’s renewed two-year, rent-free residency, which is designed to provide practical support without the pressure of a prescribed outcome.
Artspace residencies were extended to two years in 2026.
NSW musicians join Sound Country Artist Leadership Retreat
Twelve New South Wales-based musicians have been selected for Green Music Australia’s Sound Country Artist Leadership Retreat – an immersive four-day program geared towards building a greener, safer future for the music industry.
- Alex The Astronaut
- Becca Hatch
- Earl Weir (Krystal Rivvers)
- Eugene Obeng (Yawdoesitall)
- Georgia Sallybanks (Odette)
- Jake Taylor (In Hearts Wake)
- Jess Holt (total tommy)
- Joe Mungovan
- Malaika Mfalme
- Tasman Keith
- Tay Blunt (FVNERAL)
- Zoe Catterall (The Buoys)
Delivered in partnership with Sound NSW, the retreat is designed to help musicians develop the networks and skills to improve sustainability in their industry.
Using Green Music Australia’s Sound Country: A Green Artist Guide as a central tool for change, it offers the chance to learn from experienced leadership facilitators, gain skills and build community at the intersection of environment, climate, system change and music. The retreat ran in the Megalong Valley in May.
Green Music Australia CEO Berish Bilander said: ‘Musicians help shape the stories, values and norms that define our culture – at a time when we urgently need to realign how we live with the realities of the climate crisis. That’s why bringing together such a diverse group of artists to engage with critical issues like climate justice and systemic change is so incredibly important.’
