The Trinity Buoy Wharf Drawing Prize 2025 will announce £27,000 of awards for contemporary drawing on Wednesday 8 October at Trinity Buoy Wharf in London. The Trinity Buoy Wharf Drawing Prize 2025 exhibition and shortlist includes 82 drawings by 76 artists eligible for awards with a total prize fund of £25,000. A further 21 drawings by 20 practitioners shortlisted for the Working Drawing Award of £2,000. The free exhibition will be open daily from Thursday 9 October to Sunday 19 October 2025 at Trinity Buoy Wharf, London E14 0JY before touring into 2026.

Known as the UK’s most prestigious annual open exhibition for drawing, the international call for the Trinity Buoy Wharf Drawing Prize 2025 received well over 2,000 submissions from more than 1,300  candidates located across the world for its 2025 edition and eligible for four awards totalling £25,000.

A total of 103 works by 95 drawing practitioners, chosen by two distinguished Selection Panels will be shown in the exhibition: 82 drawings by 76 artists were selected for the Trinity Buoy Wharf Drawing Prize 2025 exhibition and awards by Fiona Bradley OBE, Director of Edinburgh’s Fruitmarket Gallery, Kieran Long, Broadcaster and Director of Amos Rex in Helsinki, and Soheila Sokhanvari, British-Iranian artist. 

“ It's going to be a fantastic opportunity for audiences to see a range of work that they might not see otherwise,” stated Fiona Bradley OBE, “The prize is really quite an extraordinary thing, and the range of submissions this year was incredibly broad and varied.”

“It has been a privilege to be on this side of the table” said Soheila Sokhanvari, artist, shortlisted for the Drawing Prize in 2016 and now a selector of the 2025 exhibition. “Being selected gave me a massive platform, enabling me to be seen by galleries and curators. I took selecting this year very seriously, as I know how important this prize is for artists worldwide.”

The Working Drawing Award, a special category celebrating the role of drawing within architecture, design and making processes, was selected by Pablo Garcia, Associate Professor at the School of the Institute of Chicago, Kieran Long, Director of Amos Rex in Helsinki, and Sunand Prasad OBE PPRIBA, Principal at Perkins & Will in London. 21 works by 20 drawing practitioners will be shown within this specific display dedicated to working drawings, and eligible for an award of £2,000.

The drawings selected for the Trinity Buoy Wharf Drawing Prize 2025 exhibition showcase the wide-ranging nature of contemporary drawing today: from works on paper and textiles to alternative surfaces and moving images. The selected drawings are by practitioners at all career stages and come from across the globe.                                   

“We have had an incredible range to choose from, from all around the country and beyond” explained Kieran Long, selector for both the Trinity Buoy Wharf Drawing Prize 2025 and the Working Drawing Award: “drawing itself is a wonderfully varied practice, and this is evident by the phenomenal range of submissions this year”.

The Exhibition Launch & Awards Announcement at Trinity Buoy Wharf in London takes place on Wednesday 8 October 2025 at 7pm (attendance by invitation). Five awards with a total cash value of £27,000, will be announced:
- First Prize of £8,000
- Second Prize of £5,000
- Student Award of £2,00
- Working Drawing Award of £2,000 
- Evelyn Williams Drawing Award of £10,000 and a solo exhibition at Hastings Contemporary

The Trinity Buoy Wharf Drawing Prize 2025 exhibition is open to the public from Thursday 9 October to Sunday 19 October 2025 and will then tour into 2026. Accompanying the exhibition will be a fully illustrated Exhibition Publication and an Education Pack. A one-day Drawing Symposium as well as an Educator’s Evening will be held on Thursday 9 October 2025. 

The 83 drawings shortlisted for Trinity Buoy Wharf Drawing Prize 2025 are by:
Bulent Abosoglu / Mark Anstee / Haffendi Anuar / Andy Bannister / Andrew Barrowman / John Bellwood / Vivien Blackett / Julia Brooker / Caroline Burraway / Eric Butcher / Duncan Cameron / Tony Carey / Sarah Casey / Sara Clark / Niamh Clarke / Eileen Cooper / Liz Coxford / Jan Crombie / Lucy Crouch / Katarzyna Depta-Garapich / Gabrielle Distin / John Forster / Fiona Fouhy / Todd Fuller / Enza Galantini / Steph Goodger / Euan Gray / Richard Gregory / Sean Griffin / Carla Groppi / Russell Herron / Curtis Holder / Dean Hughes / Jo Israel / Layla Jabbari / Lisa Jones / Eden & Andrew Kotting / Clara Lacy / Debbie Lee / Juliette Losq / Christine Mackey / Barry Marsden / Fernando Martin Godoy / Robert McNally / Elizabeth Nast / Tahira Noreen / Patricia Paolozzi Cain / Simon Parish / Rachel Pearcey / Julia Peintner / Keira Rathbone / Fiona Robinson / Carole Romaya / Edwin Rostron / Olivia Rowland / Diana Savostaite / Mark Shields / Stephanie Shrager / Ilona Skladzien / Arlo Smith / Kate Steenhauer / Laura Kate Sutton / Zachary Talbot-Mason / Sally Taylor / Alison Turnbull / Marika Tyler-Clark / Kirsten van Schreven / James Vassallo / Darshana Vora / Kate Walters / Boyuan Wang / Wei Wang / Henry Ward / Miranda Whall / Eleanor Wood / Amy Zhao

The 21 drawings shortlisted for the Working Drawing Award 2025 are by:
Fiona Chaney / Pete Codling / Richard Crooks / Emma Douglas / Sarah Duyshart / Patsy Hans / Alexandra Harley / Benxing Liang / Kanto Ohara Maeda / Nick Malone / Adriette Myburgh / Mandy Prowse / Aruna Radha / Mark Richards / Arthur Roberts / Amba Sayal-Bennett / Seamus Staunton / Fiona Swapp / Nathan Walsh / Wei Wang

The Trinity Buoy Wharf Drawing Prize has an established reputation as the UK’s foremost open exhibition for drawing. Established in 1994 by artist and Professor Anita Taylor, currently Dean of Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art and Design at the University of Dundee, and Director of Drawing Projects UK, the annual Trinity Buoy Wharf Drawing Prize celebrates talent and excellence in current drawing practice.

The exhibition provides an important platform for artists, designers, makers, architects and other drawing practitioners as a catalyst within their careers, and champions the role, breadth, and value of drawing in creative practices today.

The Trinity Buoy Wharf Drawing Prize is supported by the Trinity Buoy Wharf Trust - and 2025 marks the 8th year of their generous support for the annual open drawing exhibition. 

The biennial Evelyn Williams Drawing Award of £10,000 is funded by the Evelyn Williams Trust and awarded in association with the Trinity Buoy Wharf Drawing Prize exhibition. The award is made to support the recipient to develop and realise a body of new drawings for a solo exhibition or an exhibition or installation otherwise based on their drawing practice to be presented at Hastings Contemporary in their forthcoming exhibition programme. 2025 will be the fifth award, and the recipient will be selected by Leah Cross, Director of Programmes at Hastings Contemporary; Rhian Kempadoo-Millar, Evelyn Williams Trust; Anita Taylor of Drawing Projects UK. 

For press enquiries, please contact Marine Costello at Parker Harris, E: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. T: 020 3653 0891. Images and statements about each selected drawing and biographical information on those with works selected are available on request.  

For all other enquiries, please contact: 
E: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.  
T: 020 3653 0896

Images:

Alison Turnbull, Beijing, Ink on printed paper, 2025
Shortlisted for the Trinity Buoy Wharf Drawing Prize 2025

Left: Curtis Holder, Echoes of Eshu II, 2024, Coloured pencil on paper
Right: Eileen Cooper, In the Studio, 2025, Conte, pastel, charcoal on paper 
Both shortlisted for the Trinity Buoy Wharf Drawing Prize 2025.

Left: Mark Shields, Jeanne II, 2025, Charcoal on paper
Right: Fiona Robinson, War Anthem (from Mrs Dalloway Woolf Works by Max Richter), 2025, Graphite ink and water based paint 
Both shortlisted for the Trinity Buoy Wharf Drawing Prize 2025.

Kanto Ohara Maeda, Designing A Bathhouse for Film, 2024, pencil on sketchbook paper 
Shortlisted for the Trinity Buoy Wharf Working Drawing Award 2025. 

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