Kunsthalle Wien Prize 2024

The two prize-winners Rawan Almukhtar (Academy of Fine Arts Vienna) and Ida Kammerloch (University of Applied Arts Vienna) will receive a joint exhibition at Kunsthalle Wien in January 2025. Rawan Almukhtar studied Art and Intervention | Concept at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna and was awarded the Kunsthalle Wien Prize 2024 for his two-part installation HIJRA – Queering Borders and DUKHANIA – The Protesting Archive.

The Kunsthalle Wien Prize seeks to support emerging artists living and working in Vienna and to promote discourse on contemporary art via an annual collaboration with Vienna’s two renowned art universities. Jointly organised by Kunsthalle Wien, the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna and the University of Applied Arts Vienna, it is awarded annually by a jury of experts to a graduate of each of the universities. Now in its tenth year, the prize is intended to support recent graduates, building a bridge between academic study and professional practice, while bringing the work of these artists to a broader public.

The selected artists each receive a 3,000 Euro prize in addition to a production budget towards the exhibition at Kunsthalle Wien Karlsplatz in 2025. The exhibition will be accompanied by a publication with texts by Alicja Melzacka and Rijin Sahakian. A public programme of artist talks, guided tours and other events will be hosted alongside the exhibition by Kunsthalle Wien’s art education team.

For this year’s prize, the jury reviewed more than 100 diploma and masters projects from the fields of visual and media art. Over 50 graduates of each, the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna and the University of Applied Arts Vienna, submitted their work for consideration. Two artists were selected to hold a joint exhibition at Kunsthalle Wien Karlsplatz opening in January 2025: Rawan Almukhtar and Ida Kammerloch.

Rawan Almukhtar studied Art and Intervention | Concept at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna and was awarded the Kunsthalle Wien Preis for his two-part installation HIJRA –  Queering Borders and DUKHANIA – The Protesting Archive. The exhibition will present paintings and drawings that take inspiration from his experiences as a refugee and an activist. The paintings from the series HIJRA capture the stories of refugees he met on his own journey to Vienna. Another work, DUKHANIA (‘tear gas’ in Arabic) documents the actions of protestors against the Iraqi government. Through these bodies of work, Almukhtar seeks to create a collective moment of witnessing the stories of those who have been overlooked in Western Europe, while also questioning the ways in which such people should be considered.