Emerging Artists Award 2026
Melbourne Festival’s Emerging Artist Award was set up in 2014 to encourage younger artists to be part of the Festival by providing them with an opportunity to exhibit work and to benefit from a generous award.
The exhibition has become an integral part of the annual Festival, and over the past years we have given out £7500 in prize money, as well as helping young artists develop their creative practice leading to a career in the Creative Industry.
The Award has also been a platform to develop our “Spaces to Create” project in which a number of artists have joined a programme aiming to help them become self-sustaining creatives.
We are very proud of the number of previous entrants who have gone on to develop careers in Art and who have exhibited as artists on the Art & Architecture Trail. The competition is aimed at those who have already chosen to study or who have recently graduated in a creative discipline.
We look forward to seeing new and imaginative work every year, and enabling the public to visit the exhibition to see the creativity of young artists.
2026 Emerging Artist Award
“HUMANITY, NATURE & CREATIVITY”
This year we saw some of the best talent in recent years. Judges noted that entrants had created more large scale pieces which is a great contrast from the smaller scale work we’ve seen since the pandemic. Work has become more experimental, more colourful, more adventurous.
It was fantastic to see so many faces at the Awards Ceremony — the Athenaeum Hub was well and truly packed out! Thank you so much to all of the artists who attended and for your outstanding work. You made the judges’ decision incredibly difficult, so well done all!
This year’s winner was Isabelle Barnett with her oil painting “Maria”.
Runner-up was Mohamed Adam with pencil drawing “The Sibling Bond”.
Commended by the judges were Ellie Edwards with the “Earth Calendar” installation and Emma Croney’s mixed media piece, “Signal Drift”.
Finally, the People’s Choice Winner as voted for by visitors to Melbourne Festival was Francisco Guerrero with his mixed media piece, “Cenarth Falls”!
The Emerging Artist Award is one of our favourite parts of the festival. Seeing so much talent on display was such a highlight and we had so many comments from the public about the strength of the work this year. Thank you to all who applied and a big congratulations to all those shortlisted. You are all fabulous, and we can’t wait to see your careers blossom.
Keep your eyes peeled for next year’s call out — we look forward to seeing more emerging talent.
VIEW GALLERY OF PREVIOUS ENTRIES BELOW
