The London Group Open: 2025 Prize Winners

A congratulations to our 2025 Prize Winners.

We were extremely impressed with the high quality of the work this year, and the variety of ideas. The work is wonderfully diverse — bold, inventive, and full of energy. It captures what The London Group has always stood for: artists pushing boundaries, experimenting fearlessly, and sparking dialogue through creativity.

-The London Group Open Selection Committee

The JPES Partnership Prize

“JPES is proud to have sponsored a prize at this year’s Open exhibition, continuing our long-standing support of the London Group across many years. As the UK’s longest-running artists’ collective, the Group consistently showcases an exceptional calibre of work from both member and non-member artists, and we remain continually impressed by the standard on display. Supporting a prize for an emerging artist is particularly important to us, and we are delighted to champion the next generation of artistic talent.

-Julian Samways, Chair of JPES

The winner of this year’s JPES Partnership prize, Nathaniel Cooper’s Ski Lift, is a beautiful, coloured pencil drawing of a mountainous landscape that had captured the artist during a recent skiing holiday. It was a pleasure to meet Nathaniel at the prize-giving ceremony and learn that he was nearing graduation from his arts programme in the coming weeks. We wish Nathaniel the very best in his next endeavour and very much look forward to seeing more of his work in future.”

-Miles Donohoe, Managing Director of JPES

Schauerman Prize for Digital Art

“We created the Schauerman Prize for Digital Art back in 2017 to encourage more digital artists to participate in The London Group Open – and judging by the number of monitors in the show, I guessed it’s worked. Since then, we’ve awarded the prize three times: to Sandra Crisp in 2017, Chirag Jindal in 2019 and Jonathan Amour in 2023. Sandra and Jonathan are now active members of the Group and Sandra has joined Tim and me in selecting the digital prize winner since 2019. 

For The London Group’s 86th Open, we are delighted to award our prize to Jan Frith for her interactive storytelling sewing machine. Sewing Memories contains both the oldest piece of creative technology in this exhibition – the sewing machine, and the newest piece of creative technology in this exhibition – the raspberry pi. We love the combination of the analogue and the digital and are impressed with how Jan has linked them together in such an intuitive and robust way. It’s a remarkable and imaginative way to present a living archive.”

-Nicola Schauerman, half of Genetic Moo

The Armour Studio Award for Humanesque work

Why The Armour Studio Award?
My motivation for offering this award is two fold:
I have always believed in giving something back to any organisation in which I am involved.
And at the same time I want to encourage artists to view the body as a site for exploration and creative enquiry. 

There were several strong contenders for this award and decisions were made by looking not only at the artwork in this exhibition but also delving into the artists wider practice. I was drawn to Mandeep Dillon’s gossamer skins, which resonates so much about the body and the ephemeral nature of human existence. I see the skin as an interface between the human and the world around us. Mandeep talks about the delicate balance between the inner and outer pressure of her inflatables which are often re-purposed for new artworks – which reflects my thinking that we are all made of other people. 

In her work, Mandeep Dillon is touching upon an uncanny and visceral abstraction which draws a powerful parallel to the nature of the body. With Nothing Gold Can Stay, Dillon captures a strong sense of ‘The Humanesque’.

-Jonathan Armour

The Chelsea Arts Club Trust Stan Smith Award for an Artist Under 35

We are thrilled to recognise Tom Fairlamb as this year’s Stan Smith Award recipient, celebrating the originality, ambition and conceptual depth of his work Cook On High For 13 Billion Years.

The Chelsea Arts Club Trust was established in 1990 to foster excellence in art and design education and to provide vital support for artists and designers at formative stages in their careers. The Stan Smith Award honours the legacy of British artist, London Group President and Chelsea Arts Club Chairman Stan Smith, by recognising an outstanding artist under 35 selected from the London Group Open. Continuing Smith’s lifelong commitment to nurturing emerging talent, the award offers meaningful encouragement for a young artist as they progress in their practice.

-Chelsea Arts Club Trust

Below, left to right: Amanda Cornish The Maelstrom of My Mind, Sato Sugamoto Balance, Loraine Rutt Divided Globe, JPES Paul Bonomini LGP and Nathaniel Cooper, Nicola Schauerman and Jan Frith, Jonathan Armour and Mandeep Dillon