Seven artists shortlisted for prestigious Wales-based £40,000 Artes Mundi prize

Seven artists have been shortlisted for a prestigious Wales-based contemporary art prize.

Rushdi Anwar (Kurdistan), Carolina Caycedo (UK), Alia Farid (Kuwait/Puerto Rico), Naomi Rincon Gallardo (USA), Taloi Havini (Bougainville), Nguyen Trinh Thi (Vietnam) and Mounira Al Solh (Lebanon/Netherlands) are all in with a chance to win the Artes Mundi prize.

Artes Mundi is an international arts organisation based in Cardiff. The 10th anniversary edition of the biennial award is the UK’s largest contemporary art prize with £40,000 prize money.

A winner will be announced during a six-month exhibition of the nominees’ work at multiple venues across Wales taking place from October 2023 to March 2024, organisers said.

Anwar’s work reflects the socio-political issues of Kurdistan, Iraq and the Middle East, drawing on personal memories of displacement, identity, conflict and trauma, while Caycedo tackles environmental and social issues.

Farid is a filmmaker and sculptor focusing on lesser-known histories, while visual artist Rincon Gallardo is known for her dreamlike creations addressing counter-worlds in neo-colonial settings.

Havini’s work centres around issues of inheritance, mapping and representation in relation to her home town Bougainville, while filmmaker Trinh Thi explores the power of sound and listening with interests in memory, representation and ecology.

Irony and self-reflectivity are central to Al Solh’s work, exploring feminist issues and patterns of micro-history which are socially engaging, political and escapist all at once.

Nigel Prince, Artes Mundi’s director, said the 10th edition of the award will prove a “watershed moment”.

“As we simultaneously celebrate the legacies of the past 20 years working with some of the most exceptional artistic voices of recent times, we look ahead with our nationwide partners to presenting work from this edition’s shortlist that will speak to the urgent issues of our times in the most immediate of ways,” he added.