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This week’s opportunities
Awards and competitions
2025 Pinnacle Awards (WA)
WA performing arts producers and presenters will be celebrated at the Pinnacle Awards and nominations are now open to support your peers.
Nominations close 9 June; learn more and nominate.
WA Innovators of the Year Awards
The awards recognise WA innovators across seven categories with winners sharing in the program’s largest ever prize pool of over $280,000.
Applications close 11 June; learn more and apply.
Celebrating the achievements of WA businesses exporting to the world, the Awards include a Creative Industries category as well as the new category, First Nations exporter.
Applications close 13 June; learn more and apply.
Shelley Simpson Ceramics Prize 2025
The annual prize is open to all Australian ceramic artists. Applicants may be working across functional, small-scale, fine art, handcrafted or more complex commercial pursuits with ceramics.
Entries close 30 June; learn more and enter.
The Brisbane Portrait Prize celebrates the city of Meanjin/Brisbane and its people, with over $100,000 or prizes and grants available in 2025. This year, the prize consists of two key competitions: The Main Prize and the Next Gen Prize (open to entrants 18 and under).
Entries close 1 July; learn more and enter.
Grants and funding
Alastair Swayn Foundation grants for Australian design
Three grant steams are available: The $20,000 International Research Grant, $10,000 Australian Design Grants and $8000 Design Audio Grants. The Alastair Swayn Foundation is a not-for-profit organisation operating at the intersection of Australian architecture and design.
Applications close 3 July; learn more and apply.
Call-outs
North Melbourne Photo Festival 2025 (Vic)
Residents of North Melbourne are invited to make a photo submission under the categories of: Faces, Home and Street Views. The exhibition (from 2 July) hopes to invite a return to the immediacy of the everyday and build community connection. Entries are free with prizes on offer.
Entries close 16 June; learn more and enter.
Professional development
Social Media and Content Marketing for Creative Businesses (Online)
An online workshop presented in partnership with Business Victoria for creative industries business owners and entrepreneurs who want to master social media and create compelling content for their small businesses. It runs for three hours on 11 June, 10am-1pm.
Free, registrations essential; learn more and register.
Geelong Art Centre Creative Engine (Vic)
This opportunity provides two new Associate Artists with over $40,000 in cash support to develop new work and focus on artistic practice, plus rehearsal studio time and mentorship support. Victoria-based professional live performance artists are eligible to apply.
Applications close 13 June; learn more and apply.
APAX (NT)
The Australian Performing Arts Exchange (APAX) is open for registrations, this year held from 11-15 August in Darwin/Garramilla. APAX is the national market and professional development gathering of more than 450 performing arts workers to develop tours and cultivate the relationships that deliver presentation outcomes for audiences and communities across Australia.
Early Bird registrations close 11 July and all registrations close 4 August; learn more and register.
Want more? Visit our Opportunities page for more open competitions, prizes, EOIs and call-outs.
This week’s winners
Visual arts
Artspace has announced its 2025 Studio Program artists, selected from 178 applications. The cohort of 10 artists will move into Artspace’s dedicated rent-free studio spaces at Woolloomooloo’s The Gunnery to begin their residencies in early June. Maissa Alameddine, EO Gill, Jumaadi, Joan Ross and Shevaun Wright have been selected as two-year studio artists; while Yona Lee, Paula do Prado, Kien Situ and Jahhne Pasco-White have been selected as one-year studio artists, with Tina Havelock Stevens remaining in the program to deliver the 2025 Art Gallery of New South Wales and Artspace annual co-commission.
The Museum of Contemporary Art Australia (MCA Australia) has announced artists for its annual exhibition, Primavera, showcasing Australian artists aged 35 and under. This year’s selection includes Alexandra Peters, Francis Carmody, Augusta Vinall Richardson, Keemon Williams and Emmaline Zanelli, with MCA Australia’s Tim Riley Walsh as the Primavera 2025 curator. The artist selection is driven by the theme of society’s relationship to industry and the machine in the contemporary era. Riley Walsh says, “Over the course of close to 50 studio visits I conducted across the country, I saw intriguing shifts in how young practitioners are engaging with a rapidly changing socio-political and technological landscape… These five artists help broaden our world view and begin to unravel the complexity of the current era.” Primavera 2025 opens at MCA Australia from 5 September 2025 to 8 March 2026.
Performing arts
Australian Dance Theatre congratulates the inaugural LOFT residents, who will share $70,000 in funding. Over half of the cohort are local South Australian artists, with Bharathanatyam dancer and choreographer Christopher Gurusamy taking out the $30,000 EXPOUND Resident. Gurusamy receives six weeks of studio time to develop a new work. Meanwhile, eight artists from across Australia make up the EXPLORE Residents, each receiving space, time and money to crack a new idea. They are: Ade Suharto, Aimee Raitman, Alex Kuijpers, Cheeky CHandler, Kaine Sultan Babij, Natalie Allen, Thomas Bradley and Tyler Carney-Faleatua. Gabrielle Nankivell will continue development on her choreographic experiment, Conjuring (or how to make the show between us) as the 2025 PEAK Resident, receiving $12,000 and support from Adelaide Frigne. Alongside Nankivell, South Australian artists Zoë Dunwoodie, Janelle Egan and Motus Collective have each received a small grant and studio time to develop their ideas at LOFT.
The Createability program is once again giving 12 interns the opportunity for paid professional development with arts, screen and music organisations. The program aims to support the creative industries in overcoming the invisible barriers to employment for practitioners living with disability. The 2025 host organisations include the ABC, Community Broadcasting Association of Australia, Milk Crate Theatre, Musica Viva Australia, Performance Space and Sydney Theatre Company. Find the full list of interns and host organisations.
All
2025 Asia Pacific Arts Awards celebrates this year’s winners:
- Connect Award: PacifiqueX
- Impact Award: Liminal Magazine
- Innovation Award: Bábbarra Women’s Centre with Tharangini Studio
- Inspire (Individuals, groups and collectives): Taloi Havini
- Inspire – Organisations: Wantok Musik Foundation
- Legacy Award: Isabel and Alfredo Aquilizan
Highlighted award-winning projects include Hamoris Lian Timor (Reviving the Sound of Timor) by Wantok Musik Foundation, which bridges communities in Timor Leste and Australia through music, dance and storytelling; while PacifiqueX is an organisation that brings together culture and advocacy supporting Māori, Torres Strait Islander, and Pacific Islander queer communities. Learn more.
Shortlisted and finalists
Sisters in Crime has announced the longlist for its 25th Davitt Awards for the best crime and mystery books by Australian women. The longlist includes 29 titles: 15 adult novels, five Young Adult novels and six children’s novels. Judges’ Coordinator and award-winning crime short story writer Ruth Wykes says, “It was heartening to see some of the contemporary themes that were explored by the longlisted authors. In Highway 13 Fiona McFarlane imagined the long-term impact of a serial killer on people who were directly and indirectly affected by his rampage several years ago. Shankari Chandran’s Safe Haven set us squarely in an offshore detention centre in a story that enraged us, broke our hearts and shone a light on this important issue. Vikki Wakefield sent us To the River – the Murray River – where we joined a young woman and her dog in hiding after being accused of murdering her family. Glenna Thomson haunted us in Gone when we watched a family, stuck in a void of grief and hope after their child went missing.” Find the full longlist here.
The Dorothy Hewitt Award for best unpublished manuscript by an Australian author revealed its 2025 shortlist of six submissions. They are:
- Clutch Feathers, Draw Breath by Corrie Hosking
- Perpetual Stew by Georgie Harriss
- The Hair of the Pigeon by Mohammed Massoud Morsi
- Laughing River by N. J. Madden
- you are HERE by Roderick Poole
- Bad Westerns by Tim Loveday
Thirty-five finalists have been selected by the National Gallery of Victoria (NGV) to compete for The Rigg Design Prize, which profiles the outstanding Australian designers under the age of 35 this year. Traditionally, the prize has been awarded to established and mid-career design practitioners. Celebrating each designer’s achievements, the 2025 edition presents a survey of the most accomplished objects, furniture, lighting and jewellery being produced in Australia today, with the exhibition opening on 19 September at The Ian Potter Centre: NGV Australia. Finalists include Claudia Lau, Jay Jermyn, Nathan Nhan, Marlo Lyda, Ella Badu and Walter Brooks. The winners will be announced on 18 September.
Finalists for the National Indigenous Fashion Prize have been announced, featuring 38 nominees. This year’s prize categories include the Textile Design, Traditional Adornment, Wearable Art, Fashion Designer, Community Collaboration, Business Achievement and more. Finalists include Gregory Salt, Larissa Brumby, Jenny Fraser, Cathy Ward, Djilpin Arts, Jilamara Arts and Crafts Association, Marley Morgan Photography, GALI Swimwear and more. View the full list.
Nearly 200 finalists of the 2025 Environment Art & Design Prize have been revealed, with their works to be shown at Manly Art Gallery and Museum, Curl Curl Creative Space and Mona Vale Creative Space Gallery from 1 August to 14 September. Finalists include Julia Davis, Tamara Dean, Jude Hungerford, Pamela Leung, Mei Zhao, Jasmine Stein, Locki Humphrey and more. View the full list of finalists across the art, design and youth categories.
Check out previous Opportunities and Awards wraps for more announcements.
