Aesthetica announces winners of the 2026 Art Prize & celebrates 20th anniversary of the prize
Aesthetica is proud to announce the winners of the 2026 Aesthetica Art Prize, celebrating outstanding contemporary artists from around the world. The Main Prize winner is Felipe Castelblanco for Tunda: A Quantic Plant and the Devil’s Breath (2025), while the Emerging Prize goes to DIVA for Memoria 2020: When Memories Are No Longer Enough (2025).
Felipe Castelblanco is a multidisciplinary artist, researcher, and filmmaker working at the intersection of participatory, film, and Media Art. Tunda: A Quantic Plant and the Devil’s Breath is a multi-channel video that explores the entangled histories of plants and colonial extraction. We see an Indigenous man thrust from the Colombian Amazon to the Swiss Alps, drifting between vision and reality. Landing in a remote museum’s herbarium, he encounters botanical artifacts relating to the Brugmansia plant. This plant is a powerful teacher for Kamnënstá Indigenous healers in Colombia’s Andean-Amazon region. Among these communities, it is believed to possess the ability to cross boundaries of time and space. The work combines science, ethnomedicine, and ecology, encouraging us to question how we see things.
The 3-Channel video Memoria 2020: When Memories Are No Longer Enough reflects on DIVA’s identity as a Black French woman in New Orleans through the lens of another diasporic experience: a Mardi Gras Indian Queen. The Mardi Gras Indian tradition is believed to originate from encounters between Native and Black communities in the late 19th century. The Queen’s voice introduces the traditions and history of this African American cultural practice, which is rooted in community resilience and resistance. The work explores how artistic archives, cultural memory, and testimony shape belonging across diasporic histories.
Both winners are featured in the Aesthetica Art Prize 2026: States of Becoming exhibition at York Art Gallery, running from Friday 17 July 2026 – 15 November 2026. The exhibition showcases 20 shortlisted artists whose work spans a diverse range of mediums, addressing urgent global themes including the impact of emerging technologies on perception, our changing relationship with the world, memory as something continually reconstructed and identity, migration and belonging.
Since its inception in 2007, the Aesthetica Art Prize has become a springboard for some of the most dynamic and groundbreaking artists working today. Thousands of practitioners have been recognised through the Prize, and alumni include internationally acclaimed artists such as Larry Achiampong, Jenn Nkiru, Julia Fullerton-Batten, Liz West, Steve Messam and Squidsoup. Aesthetica’s magazine, in circulation for over 20 years and with a total reach of 950,000, has been instrumental in shaping conversations around contemporary culture, championing innovation and amplifying diverse voices globally.
Cherie Federico, Director of Aesthetica and Curator of the Art Prize, says:
“This year marks a significant milestone as we celebrate 20 years of the Aesthetica Art Prize. Over the past two decades, we’ve had the privilege of working with thousands of artists whose practices have challenged perspectives, sparked dialogue and reflected the complexities of our changing world.
The Prize has grown into an international platform for contemporary art, creating opportunities for artists at pivotal stages in their careers and connecting their work with new audiences. This year’s winners, Felipe Castelblanco and DIVA, demonstrate the power of art to deepen our understanding of history, identity, ecology and collective memory. Their work invites audiences to engage with urgent questions from fresh perspectives, creating space for reflection, dialogue and new ways of seeing.”
The Aesthetica Art Prize 2026: States of Becoming runs from 17 July 2026 – 15 November 2026 at York Art Gallery. The exhibition is included in general admission, available to book in advance via the Gallery’s website.