Young Prints Charming! Art prodigy, aged 9, lands city-wide climate art prize
20 November 2024: A 9-year-old girl from Woolwich has grabbed first prize ahead of 1,600 young artists from 31 schools in this year’s Young London Print Prize supported by Foundation for Future London’s Westfield East Bank Creative Futures Fund. The competition invites young Londoners to express their personal response to the climate crisis through the art of printmaking.
The beautiful, intricate winning entry by Pema Sherpa from Foxfield Primary School depicts the ocean floor and forest. Entitled ‘Fading hope’, it suggests how humanity has devalued and eroded nature. Her artwork was made using a layered block printing technique. Second prize went to Muiz Mustafa from Shepherds Bush for his bold campaigning artwork called No fly Zone that harks back to a tradition of radical political posters. Third prize was awarded to Emma Tasnim from Whitechapel for her blue monoprint of a single bird, called Mystic Blues, a Puffin’s Hues, capturing the whimsical beauty of wildlife.
Putting art back at the heart of young people’s education
What makes these artworks even more remarkable is the context in which they have been made. Arts education in state schools is in crisis. There are now 15,000 fewer teachers of creative subjects in English state secondary schools than in 2011, and the number of hours spent teaching creative subjects crashed by 23% over the same period.
The Young London Print Prize is part of a nationwide movement to reverse this. It aims to inspire the next generation of artists and reveal how young people feel about the climate crisis. Pupils learn how to make prints and prepare their own climate-themed submission to the Prize. All the artworks in the competition are judged by a team of 16 and 17-year-old student curators from across London. No adult makes any of the decisions.
The winning prints are being revealed on the full 780m2 screen of the Piccadilly Lights – an iconic landmark seen by 100 million people passing through Piccadilly Circus annually – and exhibited alongside some of Britain’s best loved contemporary artists, including Damien Hirst, Yinka Ilori, and Michael Craig-Martin, at Woolwich Contemporary Print Fair from 21 – 24 November.
Sarah Nelson, Chief Executive of Foundation for Future London, one of the Prize’s main supporters, said:
“Arts education plays a massive role transforming children and young people’s life chances. That’s why funding from our Westfield East Bank Creative Futures Fund, in partnership with Westfield Stratford City, supports projects like the Young London Print Prize. It provides an inclusive, creative, youth-led programme for young East Londoners to have a voice about the climate emergency, and illustrates why arts education needs to be at the heart of our national curriculum.”
Matt Bell, Co-Founder of the Young London Print Prize, added:
“It can feel like there’s a lot going wrong in the world today. But these young artists give us reasons to be cheerful. They’ve got talent, humour, creativity and wisdom. Enjoy their work and feel inspired!”
The Young London Print Prize is run by Woolwich Contemporary Print Fair, with support from Anthesis, the London Borough of Hammersmith & Fulham, Westminster City Council, Royal Borough of Greenwich, Landsec, Berkeley, Peabody, Essdee, and Foundation for Future London’s Westfield East Bank Creative Futures Fund, funded by Westfield Stratford City.
For more information, visit https://woolwichprintfair.com/young-london-print-prize
