A special showcase for Visual Arts Scotland‘s Inches Carr Craft Development Award is taking place at Dundas Street Gallery Edinburgh.
The showcase highlights sixteen artists who have been shortlisted by Visual Arts Scotland (VAS) for this career-changing award and £14,000 prize fund, which is conferred for extraordinary creativity, technical skill and original design, from a breadth of disciplines across Scotland’s applied arts.
The path through the Award, which comprises 2D and 3D craft and maker categories, is highly rigorous: during this showcase exhibition at Dundas Street Gallery, eight finalists will be selected (on 6th July), and each given a £250 bursary for the final stage of the Award process in September.
All sixteen shortlisted artists will be invited to submit one or two unique vessels for the exhibition Holding Conversations at V&A Dundee 25th – 27th July, then the eight finalists will be invited to take part in a micro-exhibition at the Assembly exhibition at Dalkeith Palace 14th – 17th August, proceeding to take part in One From the Cutting Room Floor – a group exhibition and presentation at Custom Lane Gallery, Edinburgh in September, during which the finalists will present their award proposals to three external industry professional judges and two VAS representatives, which will result in two winners being selected, each receiving a £5,000 bursary and £2,000 mentoring fee for the coming year.
Finally, towards the end of 2026, the Award-winners will be provided with either a duo or solo show opportunity through VAS, and their final award output will be exhibited at VAS Biennial at the Upper Galleries of the RSA building in Edinburgh, in Spring 2027.
Selected artists/makers for this year’s Award include Martha Ellis, Jennifer Alford, Fionn Duffy, Scott Smith, Carol Sinclair (whose work is pictured), Charles Young, Lynne Hocking, Hazel Frost, Richard Goldsworthy, Flore Gardner, Nils Aksnes, Kathryn Hanna, Erin McQuarrie, Kevin Andrew Morris, Felicity Bristow (whose work is also pictured) and Hannah Keddie.
Entry to the exhibition is free.
