Lancaster University student to scoop new national painting prize

A final year Fine Art undergraduate of Painting is the second student from LICA to be selected for a national painting prize in three years.

Chrysa Kanari has won a Freelands Painting Prize, which celebrates outstanding painting practice at undergraduate level, culminating in an exhibition at the Freelands Foundation gallery in London later this year.

Launched in 2020, the prize extends the Foundation’s ongoing support for artists, emerging practices and art education.

The Foundation invites every higher education institution in the UK that offers a BA Fine Art or Painting course to nominate a final year student to submit a work for the prize; either a painting or a work exploring painting in the expanded field.

Chrysa was nominated by Fine Art Lecturer (Painting) Pip Dickens, who said: “It’s not easy to select a student to nominate especially this year where the painting quality is high and range so vast.

“However, Chrysa was an automatic choice for our shortlist for the Prize and we are thrilled that out of some 60 institutions, LICA’s nomination will be one of just 12 undergraduate winners exhibiting their work, probably for the first time, in a London venue. It’s a superb kickstart to their painting career.

“This is the second time a LICA student has won the Freelands Painting Prize. Our previous winner was Georgina Harrison. We are immensely proud of these two outcomes given the Prize only launched in 2020.”

Chrysa, who has also been offered a place on the highly competitive Painting MA at the Royal College of Art, London, said: “It was a real honour to be chosen to represent the university in the competition.

“I think the most exciting part is exhibiting in London for the first time amongst other painters. I’m also looking forward to showing my work, a painting which holds a lot of meaning about my country, Cyprus, and its poignant recent history.”