The Future Generation Art Prize 2024 from the PinchukArtCentre has been awarded to Ashfika Rahman, a Bangladeshi artist. After being postponed for a year because of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, her victory was finally declared in Kyiv last week.

Rahman, a 35-year-old Dhaka native currently residing in Amsterdam, was awarded a total of $100,000 (€92,000): $40,000 (€37,000) to support her creative endeavours and $60,000 (€55,000) as a monetary reward. 

Out of over 12,000 applications from around 200 nations, her winning piece, Behula and a Thousand Tales, which addresses the position of women in society through photography, prints, text, and sculpture and frequently uses tales that have historically been silenced, was chosen. 

“This award feels particularly meaningful, especially given the global political climate we're going through. Future Generation Art Prize offers a unique platform where voices can be heard openly, allowing us to be both expressive and politically engaged. This is a space where people from all over the world can speak freely,” Rahman said at the ceremony.

An additional $20,000 (€18,000) was awarded to Special Prize winners Tara Abdullah Mohammed Sharif (27, Iraq), Bekhbaatar Enkhtur (29, Mongolia), Dina Mimi (29, Palestine), Hira Nabi (36, Pakistan), Ipeh Nur (30, Indonesia), Zhang Xu Zhan (35, Taiwan). 

Though the prize has also played a key role in platforming Ukrainian artists on a global stage (Ukrainian artist Veronika Hapchenko and Dana Kavelina were shortlisted this year, for example), Björn Geldhof, Artistic Director of the PinchukArtCentre,  believes the prize to be a powerful statement of openness and exchange beyond championing Ukrainian creativity.

“Now, working in times that are extremely challenging, the prize is also a show of strength and resilience… It shows that no matter what, Ukraine remains a country that is open to the world and remains engaged with topics and issues that concern others,” he says.

Those “challenging times” have been felt in the run-up to the exhibition, with the opening postponed from August due to power shortages in Kyiv owing to attacks on Ukraine's energy grid.

The jury included Cecilia Alemani, Curator of the 59th Venice Biennale; Alicia Knock, Curator, Head of the Contemporary Creation and Prospective Department at Paris’s Centre Pompidou; and art critic and curator Hou Hanru, former Artistic Director of MAXXI in Rome

Previous winners include: Angolan artist Nastio Mosquito who has since had solo shows at Fondazione Prada Milan and MoMa New York; Brazilian artist Cinthia Marcelle whose solo exhibitions have been shown at MoMa PS1; and Aziz Hazara whose work was commissioned for the 58th Carnegie International.