Golden Fleece Award

Independent artistic prize fund established for Irish visual artists + makers by Lillias Mitchell. CHY 13875 💛🐏

[Golden Fleece Award @GFAward]

Thank you @TheGlossMag for this great feature on the 2026 Golden Fleece Award and this year’s winners, Lisa Freeman and Adam Frew 💛🐏

Explore the full piece below:
https://t.co/quNbiCWZuW

#GoldenFleeceAward #GFAward2026

[Golden Fleece Award @GFAward]

✨ The Trustees of the Golden Fleece Award are delighted to announce visual artist/filmmaker LISA FREEMAN and ceramicist ADAM FREW as the recipients of the 2026 Golden Fleece Award. Each has received a prize of €10,000 ✨

To mark the 25th anniversary of the Award, special merit awards of €5,000 were also awarded to visual artist Conor McFeely and textile artist Róisín Pierce.

This year’s shortlisted artists — Emma Bourke, Pierce Healy, Marielle MacLeman, and Róisín O’Sullivan — each received €2,500.

👏 Congratulations to all of this year’s outstanding artists 💛🐏

To read all the details, visit our website:
➡️ https://t.co/a91B1Q0gwc

[Golden Fleece Award @GFAward]

Join us this evening at the City Assembly House, Dublin 2 from 6pm for the #GFAward2026 Award Ceremony! All welcome.

We will be announcing the winners of the two €10,000 awards - one Visual Art and one Craft & Applied Art - alongside two €5,000 merit awards and four shortlisted artists receiving €2,500 each 💛🐏

[Golden Fleece Award @GFAward]

The eighth and final artist shortlisted for the #GFAward2026 is Róisín Pierce.

A Dublin-based designer and craftsperson, her practice centres on contemporary textile work rooted in traditional Irish techniques. Using labour-intensive hand processes, she creates intricate sculptural pieces defined by a refined white-on-white aesthetic, where light, texture and detail shape the work.

Grounded in material and process, her work explores how fabric can be manipulated to create depth and form through hand-crafted construction. Each piece reflects a commitment to preserving and reimagining Irish textile traditions through contemporary making.

Read more: https://t.co/knig2gUdGz

#GoldenFleeceAward #GFAward2026

[Golden Fleece Award @GFAward]

The seventh artist shortlisted for the #GFAward2026 is Róisín O’Sullivan.

A visual artist from Cork working primarily in painting, her practice also expands into drawing, printmaking and wood-based processes. Inspired by direct experience in nature, her work explores how we see, remember and emotionally register the natural world.

Influenced by the textures of reclaimed wood and intuitive mark-making, her work combines carving, burning and painting to create pieces that sit between painting and sculpture, where gesture, light and repetition echo natural cycles.

Read more: https://t.co/DwhYrtldGp

[Golden Fleece Award @GFAward]

The sixth artist shortlisted for the #GFAward2026 is Conor McFeely.

A visual artist from Derry, his multidisciplinary practice spans installation, sculpture, sound, photography and video. His work explores narratives of ideological, architectural and psychological control, often through immersive environments that question how meaning is formed.

Influenced by research, material experimentation and intuitive processes, his work brings together critical inquiry and improvisation to examine ideas of autonomy, collective imagination and resistance.

Read more: https://t.co/zDClMfX7xg

[Golden Fleece Award @GFAward]

The fifth artist shortlisted for the #GFAward2026 is Marielle MacLeman.

Working across installation, sculpture, papermaking, textiles and photography, she explores the material traces of progress and decline. Using reclaimed and site-responsive materials, she examines the relationship between the built and natural worlds, and between handmade and industrial processes.

Read more: https://t.co/nNRrPpvJtw

[Golden Fleece Award @GFAward]

The fourth artist shortlisted for the #GFAward2026 is Pierce Healy.

A Dublin-based jeweller and engraver, he creates intricately hand-engraved pieces that explore storytelling, texture and light. Influenced by drawing, music and everyday observation, his work combines humour and narrative through expressive mark making.
Read more: https://t.co/urOxazgcKE

[Golden Fleece Award @GFAward]

The third artist shortlisted for the #GFAward2026 is Adam Frew.

A ceramic artist based in rural Northern Ireland, he creates wheel-thrown vessels with clean, simple forms that reveal the presence of the maker’s hand. His practice explores the energy and spontaneity of throwing, pushing clay to form bold, voluminous pieces. Working primarily in porcelain, he uses the surface of each vessel as a canvas, where mark, colour and texture highlight movement and form.

Read more: https://t.co/KSV8EMXlPQ

[Golden Fleece Award @GFAward]

The second artist shortlisted for the #GFAward2026 is Lisa Freeman.

A visual artist and filmmaker from County Kildare, she works across moving image, installation and scripted performance, exploring power, the body and the presentation of the self in everyday environments. Her practice draws on archives, media and local knowledge, creating site-specific works that consider how intimacy and connection can emerge in civic space.

Read more: https://t.co/1FkJKAgXOg

[Golden Fleece Award @GFAward]

The first artist shortlisted for the #GFAward2026 is Emma Bourke.

A glass artist from County Mayo, she works in lampworked borosilicate glass, creating medicinal plant forms informed by ethnobotanical research. Her practice combines traditional craftsmanship, cultural heritage and scientific research, exploring links between plants, healing and identity.

Read more: https://t.co/uelrL5vR8i

[Golden Fleece Award @GFAward]

✨SAVE THE DATE✨

The winners of this year’s Golden Fleece Award will be announced at an Awards Ceremony at City Assembly House, Dublin 2

🗓 Thursday, 23 April 2026
⏰ 6.00 PM

Join us in celebrating this year’s Golden Fleece Award winners💛🐏🎉

All welcome – no RSVP required

[Golden Fleece Award @GFAward]

We are thrilled to announce the eight artists shortlisted for the #GFAward2026, with a prize fund worth €40,000!
- Emma Bourke
- Lisa Freeman
- Adam Frew
- Pierce Healy
- Marielle MacLeman
- Conor McFeely
- Róisín O’Sullivan
- Róisín Pierce
💛🐏

https://t.co/XcoI94psWY

[Golden Fleece Award @GFAward]

'Filial Love', a solo exhibition by #GFAward2025 recipient Sasha Sykes, is on view at the RHA Gallery until 29 March 2026.

Explore more:
https://t.co/WMsLpIy2r1

Image: @sashasykes / @oliver.sears

#SashaSykes #FilialLove #RHAGallery

[Golden Fleece Award @GFAward]

Happy International Women’s Day from the Golden Fleece Trust! 💛🐏 Today we celebrate Helen Lillias Mitchell (1915–2000) — artist, researcher, educator and founder of the Trust. Shown is her painting Motley (1936), made for the RDS Competition and shown at the Dublin Horse Show

[Golden Fleece Award @GFAward]

📢 Artists! Craftspeople! Makers!

The deadline for the #GFAward2026 is TODAY - Friday 28 November - at 5pm. To be in with a chance to win one of the two €10,000 Awards on offer, enter now via our website!
💛🐏

➡️https://t.co/xbt4e8sJfp

[Golden Fleece Award @GFAward]

We are delighted to announce that Ciara Hickey is joining our Advisory Panel for the #GFAward2026 💛🐏

Ciara is a curator based in Belfast. She is co-director of Household, and previously curator of the Freelands Artist Programme through PS2 and curator at Belfast Exposed.

[Golden Fleece Award @GFAward]

Are you an arts administrator looking for a new role? Well, we're seeking to hire a new Administrator on a part-time contractual basis and it could be you!

For full job description and application information, see ➡️ https://t.co/Q79JCsdeDo 💛🐏

Deadline: 5pm, 7 November 2025

[Golden Fleece Award @GFAward]

The call for applications for the 2026 Golden Fleece Award is now open!

Two awards worth €10,000 each - one in Category 1: Visual Art and one in Category 2: Craft + Applied Art - will be made.

Deadline: 5pm, 28 November 2025
💛🐏
For full details see ➡️ https://t.co/YnZ3XSiizH

[Golden Fleece Award @GFAward]

We're hiring! The Trustees of the #GoldenFleeceAward invite applications for the position of Administrator on a part-time contractual basis.

For full job description and application information, see ➡️ https://t.co/Q79JCsdMsW 💛🐏

Deadline: 5pm, 7 November 2025