Shortlist announced for the prestigious the John Moores Painting Prize 2025

Walker Art Gallery and John Moores Painting Prize Trust have announced the five painters shortlisted for the prestigious First Prize in the John Moores Painting Prize 2025 from among the 71 contemporary painters selected to exhibit. 

The five shortlisted artists are: 

Ally Fallon is a graduate of the Manchester School of Art and was the 2023 Artist in Residence at Joya: AiR, in southeastern Spain. They have exhibited in a number of group shows across the UK, including Manchester’s HOME, Cheshire’s The FG Gallery, and Boomer Gallery, London. They are shortlisted for their work, If You Were Certain, What Would You Do Then? (2025). 

If You Were Certain, What Would You Do Then? emerged through a painting process where realistic images gradually become abstract, creating bridges between both styles. Built from cultural and aesthetic encounters, the work exists as a space for quiet reflection, embodying the artist’s belief that the pleasure lies in the making rather than the reaching. 

Davina Jackson is a London-based figurative artist working from Kingsgate workshops. She studied at Central St Martins, The Byam Shaw School of Art, and completed postgraduate studies at the Royal Academy Schools. She was elected an ARWS (Associate Royal Watercolour Society) in 2023. Her work has appeared in twelve Royal Academy Summer shows, she has had eight solo exhibitions, and her work appears in private and public collections. They are shortlisted for their work, Just Like It Was (2025). 

Just Like It Was explores the essence of an intimate moment through landscape as both stage and metaphor, focusing on themes of memory, longing, and introspection. The figures are caught in quiet observation, suspended between the external world and their internal lives as they look toward the dawn light. Light shapes both form and emotional direction, suggesting the quiet persistence of hope. 

Katy Shepherd studied fine art and painting at Bournemouth and Sheffield Colleges before postgraduate studies in painting at the Royal College of Art. She has been selected for prestigious exhibitions including the Jerwood Drawing Prize and has work in public collections including Gothenburg Museum and Maidstone Museum. They are shortlisted for their work, Bedscape 2(2025). 

The Bedscape series was born from the isolation of 2021, transforming the artist’s rumpled bedding into fantastical landscapes. The painted duvets, moulded by nocturnal movements responding to a restless mind, reveal peaks, escarpments, and folds that offer an escape from reality through intimate domestic spaces. 

Miranda Webster is a New Zealand-native, now based in Margate, who has studied and practiced globally. Their artistic studies began at L’Atelier de Sèvres, France, before graduating from Beaux-Arts de Paris. They have exhibited extensively at group shows across Paris, including at Glassbox and IESA. They are shortlisted for their work, laid out (2024). 

laid out resulted from Webster purchasing a tree from B&Q, bringing it to her studio, and deliberately letting it die before laying it out on a bathroom towel. Through painting it in exquisite detail, the work became a portrait, transforming an act of complicity in death into a practice of tenderness and care. 

Joanna Whittle graduated with honours in fine art painting, from Central St Martins, before gaining her master’s at the Royal College of Art. Born in Zambia, Whittle now lives and works in Sheffield, where she primarily creates paintings and ceramics. She has exhibited at prestigious venues including the Royal Academy and won both the Harley Open Prize and the Contemporary British Painting Prize in 2019. She is shortlisted for her work, Darkened Heart (a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth) (2025). 

Darkened Heart (a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth) explores how pure darkness can cast light, with a poisonous bead at the painting’s centre serving as a gleaming point of hardness amid the ephemeral and transitory. The work speaks to a quiet, almost unseen conflict between light and dark while searching for shelter somewhere in between, where light becomes an act of subversion and resilience. 

The exhibiting works were selected from over 3,000 entries by a distinguished jury comprising Zhang Enli, Dr Zoé Whitley, Michael Simpson, Gemma Rolls-Bentley, and Louise Giovanelli. Taking place over three stages, the paintings remained anonymous throughout the judging process, with entries ranging from large scale canvases, bold in brush strokes and colour, to small, exquisitely detailed pieces, representing the entire spectrum of contemporary painting.  

The first prize winner will be announced on 4 September, ahead of the exhibition’s opening weekend, with the winning artist receiving a first prize of £25,000 and the honour of joining an esteemed list of UK-based painters who have won the UK’s most prestigious painting prize over the past 68 years. The winning painting will be acquired by Walker Art Gallery and join its world-class collection, while the artist will also have a future solo exhibition at the gallery.   

The winner of the Lady Grantchester Prize for recent art graduates will be announced alongside the first prize winner. They will receive £5,000, an artistic residency and £2,500 worth of art materials, supported by Winsor & Newton. Visitors to the exhibition will also be invited to vote for their favourite painting to win the popular Visitors’ Choice Award, with the winning artist receiving £2,025.  

Prize-winning paintings from the John Moores Painting Prize China 2024 will also be displayed as part of the 2025 exhibition. Organised by the College of Fine Arts at Shanghai University, the China Prize was launched in 2010 to support the development of contemporary painting in China.  

Charlotte Keenan, Head of Walker Art Gallery, part of National Museums Liverpool, said:  

“This year’s selection demonstrates the extraordinary reach of contemporary painting across the UK. From Belfast to Brighton, from Glasgow to Gateshead, these 71 artists represent the vitality of painting happening in every corner of the United Kingdom today. Our congratulations go to every selected and shortlisted artist, and our thanks to all who submitted their artworks for this year’s Prize. 

The Prize continues to be a vital platform for painters working throughout the UK, and the result is a truly exciting snapshot of contemporary practice. We look forward to welcoming visitors to discover these remarkable paintings from across the nation when the exhibition opens in September.” 

The John Moores Painting Prize has awarded more than £700,000 in prize money across 32 exhibitions, which have showcased more than 2,400 works of art. Past prize winners include David Hockney (1967), Lisa Milroy (1989), Peter Doig (1993), Rose Wylie (2014), Michael Simpson (2016), Jacqui Hallum (2018) and most recently Graham Crowley winning in 2023. Sir Peter Blake, winner of the competition’s Junior Prize in 1961, is Patron of the Prize.  

John Moores Painting Prize 2025 opens at Walker Art Gallery on 6 September 2025 and runs until 1 March 2026.  

Admission is free, with all donations welcome.  

For a full list of exhibiting artists, visit the John Moores Painting Prize 2025 exhibition page. 

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