LONDON – The Chanel Culture Fund has picked the recipients of the latest Chanel Next Prize, the biennial, international arts and culture competition that sees 10 creatives take home 100,000 euros each and participate in a two-year mentorship and networking program with the brand’s cultural partners.
Established in 2021 and now in its third edition, the prize recognizes contemporary artists who, in the eyes of the Chanel Culture Fund, are “redefining their disciplines, and shaping the future of culture.”
This year’s recipients are from 10 countries and their work spans visual art, performance, design, music and film. One is a four-time Grammy nominee while another is a Grand Prix winner at the Cannes Film Festival and has been a runner-up at the Golden Globes.
The prize money is unrestricted and designed to provide the artists “time and freedom to fully realize ambitious new projects.” The mentorship and networking program is facilitated by Chanel’s cultural partners, including the Royal College of Art in London.
The Spanish artist Álvaro Urbano uses plants and botanical elements to express social themes in his work.
Members of the latest cohort are Álvaro Urbano, Ambrose Akinmusire, Andrea Peña, Ayoung Kim, Bárbara Sánchez-Kane, Emeka Ogboh, Marco da Silva Ferreira, Pan Daijing, Payal Kapadia, and Pol Taburet.
As reported, the Chanel Next Prize is part of the company’s century-long commitment to the arts that began with founder Gabrielle “Coco” Chanel’s support of avant-garde pioneers, including Salvador Dalí to Jean Cocteau.
Yana Peel, president of arts, culture and heritage at Chanel, said the prize “creates the conditions for artists to thrive on their own terms. Each winner is a trailblazer shaping the now, and defining the next with creativity and audacity. Following their journeys will be nothing short of thrilling,” she said.
In an interview, Peel added that watching the journeys of the winners “very much feels like witnessing like the future of culture unfold in real time. Across continents and disciplines, they seem to speak this shared language of curiosity, and courage. I think these artists remind us that culture is not static. It’s alive. It’s restless. It’s constantly evolving.”
The mentorship element, she added, is key. “It is a really exciting moment to be offering them something more than funding and thinking about how they come together as stars – and leave as a constellation. It’s a really, really exciting moment, thinking about how they are creating, evolving – and accelerating – culture in real time.”
The artists, who as part of the program will travel to the Venice Biennale in May, tap into history, memory, sound, the power of the human body, and the natural world, in their work.
Urbano, who was born in Madrid, and is based in Berlin, uses plants and botanical elements as a platform to explore social and cultural moments, while Akinmusire, a California native, is a composer, trumpeter, and educator who works across jazz and contemporary classical music.
A four-time Grammy Award nominee, he is considered one of the most gifted trumpeters of his generation, according to Chanel.
Kapadia’s 2024 film “All We Imagine as Light,” won the Grand Prix at Cannes, and garnered two Golden Globe nominations.
Peña, who was born in Colombia and works between France and Canada, is the director of a Montreal-based dance company, and her choreography draws on Colombian ancestral memory and the power of the body.
South Korean native Kim works across video, sound, performance, and text. Kim also works in game simulation and generative media, while Sánchez-Kane, who is based in Mexico, creates sculptures, paintings, performance art, and installations.
The Nigerian-born Ogboh’s specialty is listening and using sound to engage with place, memory, and social experiences. The Portugal-based da Silva Ferreira is a self-taught dancer and choreographer whose work blends urban, contemporary, and clubbing styles.
Daijing, who was born in China and is now based in Berlin, is an artist and composer working across music, film, performance, and large-scale installation.
Kapadia, who was born and is based in India, is a screenwriter and director who blurs the boundaries between documentary and fiction, memories and dreams. In 2024, Kapadia marked her fiction debut with the film, “All We Imagine as Light,” which received the Grand Prix at Cannes, and two Golden Globe nominations, including Best Director and Best Foreign Language Film.
The Parisian Taburet draws on inspirations including his Caribbean roots and Western art history to create work that merges the real and supernatural. He blends traditional painting techniques with airbrushing and integrates sculpture into his installations, too.
Yana Peel at the Venice Biennale in 2024, with the previous cohort of winners.
Courtesy of Chanel
Peel said it’s always a challenge narrowing the long list of candidates. “In the selection committee, there’s inevitably a question of, ‘Can we have 12 winners?’ But it’s important that we pick 10 [pioneers] because we really want to invest in them quite profoundly.”
She added that creating “alchemy” among the artists is another big consideration. While the prize is aimed at helping creatives “realize ambitious projects, and hit their broader potential,” it’s also about them coming together, and building a wider creative community over the years, she said.
“What we love is the longterm duration of the program, and we’ve seen the endless WhatsApp chats that happened between the first two cohorts. We’re super excited to envision what this community is going to look like after five groups in 10 years,” Peel added.
