Serpentine and FLAG Art Foundation launch the UK’s largest contemporary art prize

Jessie S. Martin
Dec 16
2 min read

Published on 16 December 2025

Serpentine Gallery, London Photo © Andy Stagg for Serpentine

The Serpentine Gallery in London has announced a major new transatlantic collaboration with The FLAG Art Foundation in New York, marking a significant moment in the landscape of contemporary art prizes in the United Kingdom. The newly established Serpentine x FLAG Art Foundation Prize will become the largest contemporary art prize awarded to a single artist in the UK, both in financial scale and long-term institutional commitment.

Over the course of the next decade, the prize will distribute a total of £1 million, awarding £200,000 every two years to five artists at pivotal stages in their careers. Beyond its financial scope, the prize is conceived as a platform for sustained artistic development, offering recipients the time, freedom and institutional support necessary to realise ambitious new bodies of work.

Each awardee will present a solo exhibition debuting at either the Serpentine or The FLAG Art Foundation, before being reimagined for the partner institution. This dual presentation model establishes an ongoing artistic dialogue between London and New York, reinforcing the prize’s transatlantic dimension and encouraging broader international visibility for the selected artists.

The first recipient will be chosen in 2026, with the inaugural exhibition scheduled to open at the Serpentine in autumn 2027, followed by a presentation at FLAG in spring 2028. Each exhibition will be accompanied by a dedicated catalogue and a live public programme, collaboratively developed by both institutions, underscoring their shared commitment to research, discourse and public engagement.

Unlike many prizes that prioritise age limits, the Serpentine x FLAG Art Foundation Prize is open to artists of any age and nationality, provided they have been exhibiting professionally for fewer than ten years. This criterion reflects a nuanced understanding of artistic careers, acknowledging that visibility and recognition often arrive unevenly and at different stages of life. Artists will be considered through a nomination-based process, with winners selected by a rotating international jury composed of curators, artists and art historians.

The launch of this prize positions the Serpentine and FLAG at the forefront of institutional support for emerging and mid-career artists, particularly at a time when funding structures for ambitious contemporary practice are increasingly precarious. By comparison, the UK’s most widely known contemporary art award, the Turner Prize, offers £25,000 to its winner, while other significant prizes such as Artes Mundi are awarded at considerably lower levels.

Founded in 2008, The FLAG Art Foundation has established itself as a leading non-collecting, non-profit exhibition space in New York, presenting solo, two-person and thematic group exhibitions by emerging and established artists from around the world. Serpentine, meanwhile, has built a legacy of pioneering exhibitions and public programmes in London’s Kensington Gardens, alongside its internationally renowned Pavilion programme, initiated in 2000 with a commission by Zaha Hadid.

The Serpentine x FLAG Art Foundation Prize not only reflects the shared values of both institutions—experimentation, access and international exchange—but also signals a broader shift in how cultural organisations are rethinking long-term support for artistic practice. In privileging depth over immediacy and collaboration over competition, the prize sets a new benchmark for how contemporary art can be fostered across borders and over time.