The 2025 Sobey Art Award short list is out
The 2025 Sobey Art Award short list was announced this morning by the Sobey Art Foundation and the National Gallery of Canada.
Among the finalists for Canada's preeminent prize dedicated to contemporary art are makers known for their audiovisual environments, land-based practices and immersive textile installations.
Selected from six regions across the country, the artists contending for the top honour are: Tarralik Duffy (Circumpolar), Tania Willard (Pacific), Chukwudubem Ukaigwe (Prairies), Sandra Brewster (Ontario), Swapnaa Tamhane (Quebec) and Hangama Amiri (Atlantic).
The grand prize winner will take home $100,000, while the other short-listers will win $25,000. Artists named to the long list will each be awarded $10,000.
"Congratulations to the six outstanding artists shortlisted for the 2025 Sobey Art Award," reads a statement from Jonathan Shaughnessy, the National Gallery of Canada's director of curatorial initiatives and chair of the 2025 Sobey Award jury.
"Through paintings, drawings, textiles, video, sculpture and multidisciplinary installations, their works capture the vitality of artmaking in this country today while touching on subjects pertinent to contemporary Canadian identity."
The work of the six shortlisted artists will be featured in an exhibition at the National Gallery of Canada opening in October. The grand prize winner will be named at a gala in Ottawa on November 8.
Last year, Nico Williams received the top honour. Past winners also include Brian Jungen, Abbas Akhavan and Kapwani Kiwanga.
Awarding a total $465,000 in prize money, the Sobey Art Award is the largest purse for contemporary artists in Canada and one of the richest art prizes in the world. The annual prize aims to promote Canadian artistic talents both at home and abroad.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
CTV News
11 minutes ago
- CTV News
Video shows confrontation between cougar and bear in B.C.
A wild encounter between two of B.C.'s top predators was caught on camera on Vancouver Island. An uncommon encounter between two of British Columbia's top predators has been captured by a trail camera on southern Vancouver Island. The video, shared last week by the Sooke-based Wild Wise Society, shows a large black bear seeking refuge from a cougar. The cat chases the bear off a trail and into some bushes before stopping in its tracks, seemingly satisfied with the bear's hasty exit. Experts suggest the cougar's lack of interest in pursuing the bear is a sign of a simple territorial protest. 'Predators take big risks to avoid, not only conflicts with humans, but conflicts with other species and among their own species,' Wild Wise president Mollie Cameron says. 'Most of these predators are solitary animals, besides when they're raising young or that brief period of time when they're mating.' The video was shared amid a noted uptick in cougar and bear activity in the region, including the arrival last week of a grizzly bear on nearby Texada Island, a small island in the Strait of Georgia between Vancouver Island and the B.C. mainland. Read more: Grizzly bear sighting on B.C. Gulf Island prompts warning 'Our team was speechless seeing this for the first time,' Wild Wise wrote in a social media post attached to the video of the cross-species confrontation. 'The cougar wasn't running fast; definitely not in attack mode,' the non-profit wilderness education group added. 'What we're seeing here is likely classic 'fight or flight' behaviour – both species opting for avoidance rather than confrontation. It's all about making a point and not risking unnecessary conflict.'
Globe and Mail
27 minutes ago
- Globe and Mail
When it comes to climate change, Canada needs more resilient outdoor spaces. Indigenous landscape architects can help
While consulting on the Kitchener Indoor Recreational Complex, the team at landscape architecture firm SpruceLab, recommended planting a white oak tree between the indoor pool and an underground cistern for storm water. It wasn't just an aesthetic choice; the team was thinking about water, and water's stories. Historically, First Nations of the Great Lakes planted these trees in great swaths as both food forests and to guide people from the lake up to northern bodies of water. Although a pool is no lake, the white oak would benefit from the cistern and serve as a symbol of traditional Indigenous place keeping. Kerri-Lynne Garlinski, a member of the Métis Nation of Alberta and landscape designer at SpruceLab, says this approach is part of what makes the company unique. 'I really appreciate how much we strive to make sure that we've got trees on site that are going to be cared for and are going to be maintained into the future,' she says. SpruceLab is an Indigenous and women-owned planning and landscape architecture consultancy that has offices in Toronto, Hamilton, Edmonton and Vancouver. It operates as a social enterprise focused on economic reconciliation. Sheila Boudreau, its founder and principal landscape architect and planner, started the company five years ago. Boudreau, who has mixed ancestry–Acadian from her father (with Mi'kmaq ancestors through both sets of grandparents) and Celtic from her mother (British, immigrated from Wales and Ireland) – realized there weren't many Indigenous people designing public realms, and that missing perspective was noticeable. The field needed more of a focus on working 'in a good way with Mother Earth and not causing the damage that is typically done when we take a green field and pave it all to put new developments,' she says. 'That way of work is very damaging. I've been trying my whole career to not do that.' This approach is an example of an emerging academic theory called 'critical relationalism,' which sees design as a process of relationship building for humans-to-humans as well as between humans and the rest of the living world. 'There is an emphasis for many designers on the idea of human-centric design, but I have to critique that in a sense,' says David Fortin, a Métis architect, professor at the University of Waterloo's School of Architecture and Canada Research Chair on the subject. 'I think we've been really good at human-centred design to the point that we've forgotten about the living world outside of us, and that we're damaging it,' he says. But Boudreau's inspiration was more than environmental; she also wanted to provide training opportunities in the field for Indigenous people. One of SpruceLab's primary goals is to create jobs for Indigenous women through the work of planning and landscape architecture. Although these industries are colonial practices, meaningful engagement allows for Indigenous voices to be involved in design in direct ways, she explains. Programs like Dbaajmowin (narrative or storytelling in Anishinaabemowin), an Indigenous-led artist collective that SpruceLab supports, and SpruceLab's Earth Tending, a green-infrastructure training program for Indigenous people that are under-employed and unemployed, create a positive domino effect amongst communities. For example, when SpruceLab needs furnishings for a project, they work with First Nations artists who can transfer traditional knowledge through their pieces. Additionally, some Earth Tending graduates take on landscape jobs and bring the teachings with them. 'When you connect with nature, you're going back to your heart and to your soul. And there's a spark. [Participants] want to learn more. And when you want to learn more, you pass that information along to your children, your friends,' says Gwen Lane, the Earth Tending program coordinator for SpruceLab, member of the Sagkeeng First Nation and a Sixties Scoop survivor. As climate change effects worsen, it is especially critical for communities to invest in climate resiliency and understanding how respecting the earth makes a difference. We need trees that can thrive through increased stormwater and plants that can survive drought, and we need people who have the knowledge to care for them. 'Some of this work might not sound radical in a sense, but it is emblematic or representative of a shift in design thinking that I think is really rooted in Indigenous teaching and value systems,' says Fortin. One in a regular series of stories. To read more, visit our Indigenous Enterprises section. If you have suggestions for future stories, reach out to IE@
CTV News
29 minutes ago
- CTV News
Actor Melissa O'Neil talks 'The Rookie' season eight and reflects on her 'Canadian Idol' win
Video At the Bell Media upfronts, actor Melissa O'Neil chats with CTV's Jee-Yun Lee about The Rookie's eighth season, and her 2005 Canadian Idol win.
