The RDS Visual Art Awards is the most important platform for visual art graduates in Ireland. It has a very important social impact to artists and the country’s cultural industry as it provides substantial funding to arts programming. The Awards also create a high-end curated exhibition opportunity with a significant prize fund this year of over €40,000, as well as vital exposure for emerging visual artists as they move into early professional practice.
RDS VISUAL ART AWARDS – 2024 WINNING ARTISTS ANNOUNCED. See HERE
This year’s curator is Colin Martin RHA Head of School, a dynamic learning environment that supports art students to build the skillset and material knowledge to make creative and exciting art for today. Martin will also design the exhibition space with this year’s exhibiting artists.
10 exhibiting artists that have been meticulously selected to exhibit this year and they have been chosen from some of the best BA & MA visual art graduates from all over Ireland, having gone through a rigorous competitive two-stage process to get their work into this much sought show for emerging artists. The 2024 exhibition will be embedded into the RHA Gallery’s core programming as it runs from 22 November, 2024 to 18 January, 2025 – giving further opportunity to the artists’ work to be seen at an internationally renowned gallery space and for a proper run period of time that gives impetus to spotlight their work holistically.
This year’s team of independent curators appointed by the RDS to conduct the initial longlisting process for the 2024 RDS Visual Art Awards included Paul McAree, Eamonn Maxwell, Rayne Booth, Sarah McAuliffe and Benjamin Stafford. They visited end of year degree shows in art colleges across the country – and between them they longlisted 120 artists who were invited to apply for the 2024 RDS Visual Art Awards. Completed applications from these emerging artists were then assessed by the RDS Visual Art Awards judging panel who shortlisted them down to 56 candidates, before selecting the final 10 artists for inclusion in this year’s exhibition.
From the shortlist, the judging panel decide on who will showcase their work in the 2024 RDS Visual Art Awards exhibition at the RHA Gallery. The 2024 panel includes: Mary McCarthy (Chair of the 2024 VAA panel and Director, Crawford Gallery), Eithne Jordan (RHA Nominated Judge), Janice Hough (IMMA Nominated Judge), Gary Coyle (National Gallery of Ireland Nominated Judge) and Irish artist Colin Martin (Professional Artist & 2024 RDS VAA’s Exhibition Curator).
Each of the ten exhibiting artists will be in with the chance to win one of the five prizes on offer including: The RDS Taylor Art Award (€10,000); R.C. Lewis-Crosby Award (€5,000); RDS Members’ Art Fund Award (€5,000); the RDS Mason Hayes & Curran LLP Centre Culturel Irlandais Residency Award, in Paris (€8,000 value); The RHA Graduate Studio Award (€7,500 value); and finally a new Award – the RDS Graphic Studio Dublin Emerging Visiting Artist Award (€5,000 value); Winners will be announced on the opening night of the show (22 November).
Colin Martin RHA , Artist and 2024 RDS Visual Art Awards Exhibition Curator said:
The RDS Visual Arts Awards is an exciting and dynamic exhibition that brings together the innovative and relevant art practices of an emerging generation of visual artists, where platform, practice and audience meet. The alchemy of these interwoven strands has a storied history and has forged the careers of many of the todays leading voices in contemporary visual arts from established artists Dorothy Cross and James Hanley to new voices in contemporary art such as Elaine Hoey and Bassam Al Sabah. This is a rigorous all-Island selection process and I am delighted to act as curator for this year’s iteration to be held at the prestigious RHA.
Andrew Power, Chairperson of the RDS Foundation Board said;
The RDS is delighted to partner with the RHA for the annual RDS Visual Art Awards. Ten emerging artists from across the island of Ireland will exhibit their work in the RHA galleries this winter. This year the RDS Foundation can announce that the prize fund is €48,000 and continues to represent the most significant series of awards for emerging visual artists in Ireland. The RDS Foundation is committed to the advancement of excellence in; the Arts, Agriculture, Enterprise, Equestrianism, and Science.
The RDS Visual Art Awards is a substantial and pivotal Arts project that supports emerging professional artists in Ireland. It exists to support their work at this vitally important moment in their careers culminating in a long-running exhibition at IMMA this year which enables them to professionally present their work with an opportunity of winning one of five awards on offer to help launch their future work in 2025.
2024 RDS Visual Art Awards exhibitors are:
CAHAL O’CONNELL / MISS MARY JANE
MARY MADELEINE MC CARROLL & Performance Times
Images: 01. Sorcha Browning, Eden, Image courtesy of the artist.
02. Keara Simonsen, Still from Kapuluan, Image courtesy of the artist.
03. Ava Lowry, Wrapping II, Image courtesy of the artist.
04. Cahal O’Connell/Miss Mary Jane, Backstage Bunny #2, Image courtesy of the artist.
o5. Claire Ritchie, The Mutterer, Image courtesy of the artist.
06. Fionn Timmins, Ciorcal na nDéise, Image courtesy of the artist.
07. Heather Hughes, i can be your dancing girl, Image courtesy of the artist.
08. Mary Madeleine McCarroll, Blackboard 3: Unnamed Fragments from the Douendom, Image courtesy of the artist.
09. Stell De Burca, Make your Transition, Image courtesy of the artist.
10. Kyle Fairbanks, Midnight diner, Image courtesy of the artist.
#RDSVAAs www.rds.ie/rds-foundation/arts
Instagram: @rdsdublin X: @TheRDS Facebook: RDSdublin linkedin: TheRDS
