Banner image: A tiled image repeating across the screen. Adam Reynolds' head is side on as he uses tools to carve at a stone-like object on the floor.

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The Adam Reynolds Award (ARA) was previously known as the Adam Reynolds Memorial Bursary. 

The Adam Reynolds Award is Shape Arts' flagship award, set up in 2008 in memory of the life and work of sculptor Adam Reynolds. It is designed to support a mid-career disabled artist or artists, looking to develop their practice and build their profile by offering funds and a key development opportunity in connection with a high-profile cultural location or gallery. 

The award aims to provide an opportunity for artists to develop their ideas and practice without pressure to deliver a particular outcome such as finished or exhibition-ready work. It operates additionally to provide space, time and financial support within a framework of constructive and creative critical dialogue. A commemorative publication celebrating 10 years of the Award can be found on the ISSUU website via this link.

Adam was inspirational as an artist and a man - seeing his disability as a strength. This bursary is the most practical and powerful way to continue doing what Adam did to make the possible palpable.

- Sir Antony Gormley

You can read more about Adam, his work and obituary in The Guardian, written by Sir Nicholas Serota, Chair of Arts Council England, here.

How do we select our Adam Reynolds Award awardees?

Usually we do not hold an open call, and work with our networks and wider community to select an artist each year to receive the bursary. Alongside the main award, we produce a shortlist exhibition where a select group of artists considered for the award have an exhibition and each receive a smaller grant.

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We are very grateful to the Garfield Weston Foundation for their support of the Adam Reynolds Award.

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