Aesthetica Art Prize Artists Explore Environmental Themes Through Diverse Media

Five artists featured in the Aesthetica Art Prize present works examining humanity's relationship with the environment through painting, sculpture, installation, and photography. Anthony Garratt created a dual-site painting installation in North Wales, placing one four-and-a-half meter painting on Llyn Llydaw lake on Snowdon and another in an abandoned slate mine, filming both as natural processes affected them over time. Jim Jacobs crafts sculptures by grafting tree limbs to milled lumber, wooden tools, furniture, and human hair, creating works that reflect on our peculiar relationship with nature. Ukrainian-German artist and diver Alexej Sachov merges photography and painting to highlight underwater beauty and fragility, advocating for environmental protection through his artistic practice. Ingrid Weyland's photographic collages incorporate images from Argentina, Greenland, and Iceland to explore the Anthropocene's impact on landscapes, using expanded photography techniques. Jeremy Underwood's Human Debris project creates site-specific sculptures from discarded objects in Houston's waterways, photographing them before leaving them to be discovered, challenging viewers to reflect on consumer culture. The Aesthetica Art Prize is currently accepting entries with a deadline of 31 August 2026. These artists collectively demonstrate how contemporary art can serve as both witness to environmental risk and proposition for new human-environment connections.