AXA Art Prize US
2026 Finalists
New York Academy of Art,
Tribeca
AXA Art Prize US
2026 Finalists
New York Academy of Art
Tribeca
The AXA Art Prize is one of the leading student art competitions in the United States. The competition is open to any style of figurative paintings, drawings, and original printmaking created by undergraduate and graduate art students. Now in its ninth year in the United States, the AXA Art Prize has established an excellent reputation as an insightful overview of the best new talent nationwide.
From nearly 600 submissions reviewed by our panel of Regional Jurors from educational institutions across the US, 40 students artists have been chosen as exhibition finalists from curators Laura Hoptman of the Drawing Center, Christopher Lew from C/O: Curatorial Space, independent curator, Monique Long, and Jasmine Wahi of Project for Empty Space. The exhibition will be on view this fall at the New York Academy of Art.
First and Second Prizes will be selected by our Prize Jury of world-renowned artists Ann Craven, Amy Cutler, and Kiki Smith, alongside AXA XL’s Jennifer Schipf, Global Chief Underwriting Officer, Fine Art & Specie.
Artists
Pratt Institute
The Night Wears Prussian Blue, 2025, acrylic on Bristol paper, 14 x 17 inches
Through my practice, I wish to expose how feelings of sociological alienation subtly yet deeply impact one’s introspective experience and relationship with self-perception. Influenced by my synesthesia, I paint figures in vivid palettes and surreal environments, revealing feelings only articulated in the unconscious mind. In this piece, inspired by the compositional logic of surrealist cinematography, I depict a scene from a personal dream.
Website | www.rumispaintings.com
Fashion Institute of Technology
Boy Wonder, 2026, oil on aluminum, 20 x 16 inches
For Boy Wonder, I portrayed my boyfriend as a Baroque royal draped in silk posed like a Velazquez subject but holding his gaming console. The irony is intentional. Young black men are rarely given the space to explore these dynamic and theatrical concepts, often boxed into a rigid label. My goal was to embody his quiet defiance.
Instagram | @ashleyazael_
Website | www.ashleyazael.myportfolio.com
Fashion Institute of Technology
Jailbroken, 2025, oil, acrylic marker, sequins, rhinestones, and nail polish on aluminum panel, 20 x 16 inches
I use my collage, painting, digital technique, and all other random materials (like nail polish or wood stain) to communicate the feelings of hyperfeminism as a queer person. I aim to strike nostalgia in the hearts of AFAB people, and try to show femininity in a way that isn’t too serious. It’s ok to be silly, and it’s ok to be a girl, which is for some reason a very controversial statement.
Instagram | @ava_ba__
New York Academy of Art
Matinal, 2026, charcoal and carbon chalk on paper, 23.5 x 19.75 inches
The creation of a drawing indicates a perspective which is different from any other, and yet the existence of one perspective implies all others; form does not arise independently. All forms exist as vesicles of information within a deterministic matrix. The unique position of the artist is to focus on, alter, or omit this information to uncover the rhythm of patterns and vortices to show connection from one thing to another.
Instagram | @danielbeckartist
Cleveland Institute of Art
Threaded Roots, 2025, conté crayon on toned paper, 22.75 x 15 inches
My work is rooted in a Black American perspective, shaped by how I emotionally and intellectually engage with the world. Through figures, lancolmdscapes, and animals, I tell stories of triumph and resilience. Motifs inspired by Black American heritage quilts and West African textiles symbolize a severed yet enduring connection to ancestral roots, embodying pride and creativity passed through generations. My practice is a way to reclaim agency, build confidence, and navigate the world as a person of Afrocentric descent.
Instagram | @ashton_.burton
Website | www.ashton-burton-gallery.com
Rhode Island School of Design
Friend or Foe?, 2026, oil and acrylic airbrush on canvas, 42 x 32 inches
I use the history of maroonage– the practice of enslaved Africans escaping the plantation to live hidden in nature and form self-sustaining communities– as a stage upon which to unfold dramas through narrative paintings, drawings, collage, and installation. These often-anachronistic works examine ideas of escape, conflict, spirituality and religion, and man’s relationship to land and the rest of the natural world.
Instagram | @princeton_cange
Website | www.princetoncange.com
St. Joseph’s University
The Caucus Race, 2025, acrylic on canvas, 42 x 48 inches
Many fear the clown, yet it exists within us all. It is the unconscious: innocent, impulsive, and battling adult knowledge. Through the clown, surreal imagery, and unconventional machine-like self-portraits, I aim to capture the uncanny feelings created when our childhood dreams seem more real than the rational adult world. My work represents adult fears that were once childhood fantasies depicted through Freud’s view of ‘the uncanny’, and Jung’s ‘trickster archetype,’ highlighting self-destruction and societal defiance.
Instagram | @n_elation_studios
Website | www.behance.net/nataliechudeckiart
California State University Long Beach
Always the Artist, Never the Muse, 2025, oil on canvas, 40 x 30 inches
My work focuses on interpersonal relationships and how they shape you as a person. Through figurative drawings and paintings, I represent the relationships that have influenced my sense of self, my understanding of connection, and my life. Always the Artist, Never the Muse, reflects a period of my life where I yearned to be an artist’s muse; I wanted to be captured the same way my work captures the people treasure most.
Instagram | @danado.art
New York Academy of Art
Dirty Laundry, 2025, oil on canvas, 48 x 48 inches
Having grown up in a country so incredibly different from which I was born, I grew up analyzing people’s habits, culture and speech patterns. Partially in the hope I’d morph into the crowd, but also out of fascination and a deep desire to understand and to be understood. To me, painting is a method of understanding and I hope my work can be, not only a representation of who I am, but a representation of humanity and how we, as humans, interact with the world and our physiological relationships to physical spaces.
Instagram | @essiarts
Website | www.essiarts.com
Maryland Institute College of Art
Portrait of Imauri, 2026, oil on canvas, 20 x 16 inches
My practice is rooted in observation from life as a means to grasp the nuances of the visual experience otherwise inaccessible through the use of photographs. Working from life provides an opportunity for deep connection to the visual world which promotes meditative contemplation and an attention to detail. Depicting introspective moments, I explore the psychological space between the artist and sitter, and the emotional connection derived from the intimacy of these moments.
Instagram | @graceva_art
Stockton University
Our Lady, Queen of Palestine, 2024, oil on canvas, 19 x 24 inches
I am a multidisciplinary artist navigating what true freedom and hope looks like under oppressive systems. To truly bring to light what integrity is, a tangible world where Palestinians can find their determination under total irreverence. Life comes full circle to those with the most reverential courage and sovereignty to protect humanity.
Instagram | @sansandreamer
Website | www.sansandreamer.com
Cranbrook Academy of Art
En Route, 2025, oil on panel, 30 x 40 inches
In 2019, I lost two of my closest friends to the opioid crisis. Since their death, painting their image has taken the quality of a resuscitative act. Somewhere between the documentary candor of vernacular photography and the plasticity of oil paint lies a sense of the numinous; I find the mark with the edge of a razor.
Instagram | @chelseaharrisart
Website | www.chelseaharrisart.com
Virginia Commonwealth University
Late Night, 2025, oil, linoleum print, paper and fabric collage, and laser-cut board on canvas, 36 x 36 inches
Thương is a powerful word in Vietnamese. Thương means unconditional love, a love that exceeds one’s personal selfishness. Paradoxically, when you add the adverb “bị” in, bị thương means to be hurt. This painting explores the contradictory meaning of this word. The scene captures alternative ways of expressing affection, when overt expression is avoided within Vietnamese culture. The contrast between the cool tone background and the warm tone foreground highlights the quiet intimacy being shared.
Instagram | @arttrang0503
Website | www.tranghuynhstudio.com
Fashion Institute of Technology
Boy’s Latrine, 2026, oil on hardboard, 24 x 18 inches
My work explores themes rooted in my individuality as an Asian American Transgender artist. I have background experience as a musical stage actor and have spent the past 4 years at the Fashion Institute of Technology studying illustration and fashion. I see beauty in every little thing and like to keep a positive outlook on every situation. During times of global uncertainty, I remain vigilant and aim to encourage and empower queer people.
Instagram | @mikiidrew
Website | www.mikiidrew.com
University of Southern California
Last Bloom, 2025, Korean pigment on mulberry paper, 24 x 20 inches
I create paintings and ceramic sculptures that explore motherhood and women’s resilience through personal experience and Korean cultural history. Using imagery from nature alongside traditional materials such as Hanji and pigments, I reflect on maternal protection, sacrifice, and inherited memory. My work confronts issues of preference for sons and the legacy of the Comfort Women, while drawing on Korean folktales and Minhwa painting to examine how feminine love, endurance, and care continue across generations.
Instagram | @yoons.piece
Website | www.yoonslee.com
New York University
The Ecstasy, 2025, graphite on paper, 14 x 17 inches
The Ecstasy captures a fleeting moment of loneliness and dissociation within overwhelming closeness. Set in a party of alcohol, light, and crowded bodies, two intimate figures appear as doubles of one split self. Using graphite on paper, I treat drawing as a less conscious act of surface carving, building a tactile and ambiguous material field between skin, glass, fabric, and light where psychological and bodily boundaries briefly dissolve through ecstatic intensity.
Instagram | @lindsayyliang
Website | www.lindsayliang.com
New York Academy of Art
Death Valley, 2024, oil on aluminum, 18 x 24 inches
My paintings are an exploration of body and land. I take off grid landscape painting trips to live in a van and bike across the states while carrying a tent, stovetop, and paint supplies strapped to the back of my bike. I paint the illusion of light outdoors and apply those fundamentals to my figurative work in the studio while using unconventional painting techniques that require months of buildup, scraping, glazing, and sanding.
Instagram | @kellymicca
Website | www.kellymicca.com
Savannah College of Art and Design
Family Heirloom, 2026, oil on canvas, 40 x 30 inches
I create figurative oil paintings that investigate the complex intersections of personal emotion and lived experience. By weaving narrative storytelling into my compositions, I capture the dynamic tension between external reality and interpersonal connection. Ultimately, the work invites audiences to look beyond literal representation and participate in a deeper, internal psychological exchange.
Instagram | @art_jonghyun
Maryland Institute College of Art
Pink Stripe (Cross My Mind), 2026, acrylic, thread, fabric, glass beads, paper, crayon, and fishing wire on shaped canvas, 27 x 25 inches
We seek worship in everyday life, and beg for something to be worthy enough. I see small glimpses into a world that I’ve gradually forgotten, one that I’ve started to apprehensively worship. My internal world distorts what I remember, echoing like crashing waves heard through a conch shell, combining who I think I am, with how I was, and who I want to be. Pink Stripe calls to the dichotomy within us all, fervently.
Instagram | @momj34ns
Website |www.malyssaollarart.cargo.site
The Cooper Union
Kia, 2023, oil on wood, 34.5 x 24 inches
My painting practice often explores the loss of memory and identity, but this work focuses on a present, personal connection with a close friend. Through portraiture, I am interested not only in capturing physical likeness, but also the emotional relationship between painter and subject. Painting someone I know deeply is difficult because no image can fully hold their essence, yet this work is my attempt to come close.
Website | www.lucy-pan.com
Carnegie Mellon University
In This Home Eggs Fry Themselves, 2025, batiked synthetic fiber reactive dye on cotton and grommets, 27 x 27 inches
In This Home Eggs Fry Themselves is hand-painted with synthetic dyes onto cotton and batiked with wax to create the intricate patterns sewn onto the borders. By using the ritualistic imagery of dining and exploring a non-normative domestic space, this piece queers tropes of traditional female friendship, disrupts domestic routine, and subverts heteronormative ideas of femininity. The figurative nature is derived from personal feminine influences and directly represents and obstructs traditional femininity and gendered relationships.
Instagram | @eat_paint_8
Website | www.hannahparas.com
Savannah College of Art and Design
An Army of Lovers Cannot Lose, 2026, oil on cotton, 36 x 48 inches
My paintings are acts of witness — celebrating the queer community not through struggle alone, but through the full weight of our joy, our love, and the radical power of being seen. Visibility is political, which means our authenticity is resistance and our love is essential. Every portrait I paint carries the echoes of those who fought before us, honoring the collective presence that makes it possible for us to exist as we are now.
Instagram | @aslanptkv.arts
Website | https://aslanpetkovpaintings.wixsite.com
Savannah College of Art and Design
The Girl With no Hands, 2025, oil on canvas, 40 x 30 inches
I inhabit a narrative painting realm in which experiences of neurodivergent womanhood become illustrated lore. With subjects ranging from beasts to archetypes, I see my work as encounters with “otherness” and the language of mythology as a reflection of the myths, misconceptions, and social challenges of the neurodivergent mind. My role of storyteller is inextricable with painting, so I richly layer these retellings with references to Germanic fairytales, Celtic folklore, and parables from my upbringing.
Instagram | @artbyallison_pietsch
Website | www.allisonpietsch.com
California College of the Arts
I Measure Time in Bottles of Shampoo, This Time I Used None, 2025, oil on wood, 24 x 26 inches
My practice emerges from an insistence on the body—the interior is made exterior, acknowledging the weight and warmth of living forms, and reconsidering the embodied realities that tether us to the world. My work sanctifies and immortalizes fleeting images of print ephemera and digital landscape. By placing these elements alongside the materiality of flesh, I recontextualize the gaze in a time where everything is visible, yet nothing is truly seen.
Instagram | @bleedpinkwithme
Website | www.lolareed.com
Savannah College of Art and Design
New Beginnings, 2025, oil on canvas, 48 x 48 inches
My paintings challenge reductive portrayals of Nigerians by centering dignity, presence, and cultural vibrancy. Using acrylic and oil, I draw from Nigerian textiles, Nollywood lighting, and contemporary visual culture to create figures that feel intentional and assured. Through color, scale, and pattern, my work repositions Nigerian identity beyond stereotypes and insists on African art as living, evolving, and firmly rooted in the present.
Instagram | @artofdara.r
Website | www.dararicketts.com
Rhode Island School of Design
Cami, Sonríe!, 2025, oil on canvas, 48 x 36 inches
Rooted in memory and storytelling, my work draws heavily from my upbringing and community. I am inspired by everyday moments, traditions, and universal narratives. I explore themes of nostalgia and belonging to create reflections of what I call home, weaving together visual elements from childhood and now. My work is a heartfelt tribute to family, humor, heritage, and the power of personal expression through self-portraiture.
Instagram | @camilaasalinaas
Website | www.camilasart.com
Maryland Institute College of Art
Fish Bladder Configurations, 2026, graphite on paper, 11 x 7 inches
There is a sense of the impersonal, of something infirm facing a command for submission. Creating images is a compulsive need to ensure this perception not be profaned as defacement is the will of the collective of personality. This practice exists aside from recreation or reflexive expression to the end of seeking labor as anchoring. This is neither secular nor meant as a metaphor; its reality is evidenced by its labor.
Website | www.klaraseib.carrd.co
Fashion Institute of Technology
Year of the Rooster, 2025, oil on aluminum, 20 x 16 inches
In Year of the Rooster, I explore identity through utilizing symbolism as a mechanism for storytelling. Inspired by my loved ones, this piece focuses on strength and the power that comes from appreciating roots that can sometimes feel disconnected from where you are now. Through oil, I depict the agency we have over how we resonate with our backgrounds, and how just because something feels far away, it doesn’t mean that it matters any less.
Instagram | @illusifling
Website | www.mollysifling.com
Rochester Institute of Technology
Chatter, 2025, oil and graphite on canvas, 24 x 40 inches
In my work, I challenge my understanding of connection and relationship obligations by using visual tension. Contrasting areas of precision with areas of ambiguity, I visually represent how emotional experiences shape perception. My interest in forensic psychology informs the work; I identify patterns, examine behavior, and develop a greater understanding of how memory can deceive.
Instagram | @diaryyish
Fashion Institute of Technology
Lost Paradise, 2026, acrylic on canvas, 12 x 36 inches
Lost Paradise reflects my first trip to Korea at age 20, where I searched for connection to my roots but felt too Americanized to be accepted. Set within Gyeongbokgung Palace, the triptych moves from the king’s throne to the Seoul skyline, with the figure obstructing the future beneath the ornate ceiling. Korea’s intense summer rain and humidity create a dreamlike yet nightmarish atmosphere, reflecting the beauty and pressure to achieve perfection within society.
Instagram | @jenerationstar
Website | www.jenstar.cargo.site
Fashion Institute of Technology
Food Coma, 2025, oil on aluminum, 16 x 20 inches
My work focuses on quiet moments that often go unnoticed, like the end of a long day after finishing a meal that you had been looking forward to. Through my careful attention to posture, lighting, and domestic details, I aim to create a scene that feels both personal and familiar. My piece invites viewers to reflect on peaceful exhaustion and quiet contentment.
Instagram | @nessillustrations
Georgia Southern University
Smoke Break, 2026, oil on canvas, 40 x 30 inches
My work explores moments where familiarity begins to fracture, allowing hidden aspects of the self to surface through connection. In Smoke Break, mirrored figures exist somewhere between reflection and encounter, capturing a moment where guardedness begins to dissolve and both individuals are able to exist without performance. What appears to be an ordinary exchange becomes a quiet confrontation with the parts of ourselves we keep hidden and the rare comfort of having those parts understood.
Instagram | @shea.tingler
Website | www.sheatingler.carrd.co
Maryland Institute College of Art
Heirloom, 2026, oil on canvas, 48 x 36 inches
Throughout my work I use elements that aren’t always visible in the real world to represent how I see the world around me. I add things from my childhood that may not make sense to others but are important to me. I create paintings that have many layers to them, often hiding the true meaning of my paintings as I want viewers to come up with their own interpretation of my work first.
Instagram | @nadi.elise_
University of Massachusetts Dartmouth
Those Who Remained Standing for Freedom, 2026, oil on shaped panel, 33.5 x 40 inches
My work explores the inner landscapes of lived experience, particularly among women shaped by memory, displacement, and inherited trauma. In this work, painted cutout forms extend beyond the traditional rectangle, allowing the figures to physically occupy space while remaining rooted in painting. Drawing from Persian ornamental language and domestic interiors, I create layered psychological spaces that hold tenderness, grief, and resilience simultaneously.
Instagram | @sarah.vnz.studio
Website | www.sarahvalinezhad.com
University of North Carolina Asheville
Telophase, 2025, oil on wood, 24 x 16 inches
This piece was created out of a desire to push my self-portrait practice further after success with a more standard approach. After chancing upon this antique tea pitcher, it was clear that its dynamic reflective surface would provide for a challenging and enjoyable painting experience. It became a kind of crystal ball where I could explore the relationship between different sides of oneself and their relationship with a strange, mundane world.
Instagram | @noahvolkk
Rhode Island School of Design
Crowd 4, 2026, oil and acrylic on canvas, 16 x 22 inches
My work focuses on the concept of sonder and the small, but impactful interactions between strangers in a fleeting moment. I am interested in the multifaceted nature of a crowd, the stands and recognizing the humanity that exists all around us in a world increasingly defined by speed, distraction, and disconnection.
Instagram | @artbyinga
Website | www.ingawilhelmyart.com
School of the Art Institute of Chicago
Dream Journey to the Peach Blossom Land, 2024, oil on canvas, 30 x 24 inches
My work explores immigration, perseverance, and belonging shaped by my experience as a first-generation Korean immigrant. Through figurative paintings of myself and individuals from underrepresented communities set in liminal, dreamlike spaces, I reflect on labor, escapism, and fractured ideas of home. I incorporate elements from Korean art and history, reinterpreted through Western classical painting techniques, to examine the complexities of the diasporic experience and transformation.
Instagram | @janiceyangart
Website | www.janiceyangart.com
Rhode Island School of Design
Taiyuan, 2025, oil on canvas, 32 x 39.25 inches
My body of work functions as an “Evidence of Existence,” using various forms of documentation to anchor otherwise fleeting and subjective memories. Taiyuan, named after the city I was born in, has indexical imagery like family portraits and maps meeting my own hazy recollection of a distant time: an assurance that despite how the world and I have changed, certain moments retain their meaning.
Instagram | @manliyangg
School of Visual Arts
Answer the Question, 2024, oil on canvas, 47 x 35.5 inches
Born and raised in Shanghai and working primarily in figurative oil painting, I focus on memories of adolescence and religious imagery, to depict ritualistic group behaviors. Through vibrant color and expressionistic distortion, my work explores the tension between collective life and individual’s feelings, reconstructing memories that are both familiar and disturbing.
Instagram | @yihua1106art