This Sunday a Scottish painter was awarded first prize at Chelsea Old Town Hall as the venue played host to the seventh edition of the London Art Biennale.
The Gagliardi gallery who have been on Kings road for nearly 50 years hosted the event and this year winner of the 1st Prize was Malawi born, Scottish artist, Alan MacDonald.
Describing the moment of winning Macdonald said: “ It’s a bit surreal.
“I worked for years on my work and it’s never really won anything and then suddenly out of the blue they said my name.”
His artistic process is a combination of instinct and hard work as he has slowly developed a style over years of practice: “I paint figuratively, but I always start with an abstract idea.
“It begins with the main figure – not quite knowing where I’m going – and then I let it kind of follow on from there.”
For the winning painting – a 70.1″ × 79.9″ oil on linen painting called Euphorus – this was particularly true.
Macdonald said: ”Timing was important for this painting, we had moved to Edinburgh about six months before and it was a really difficult winter trying to get our house all sorted, so I got really depressed and then, then the spring came in Edinburgh and it is just unbelievable.
“It just blossoms, and they don’t cut their trees the way they do in Dundee, they let them grow and they were all… it was just amazing.
“I just put that all into my painting, just the sense of life coming back in. The euphoria at the end of the winter.”
Alongside the Sunday awards which are listed in full below, the event also hosts a speaker on the opening night which saw Hala Badri, director general of Dubai Culture and Arts Authority speak to the crowd.
The work exhibited included a huge range of mediums selected by the Gagliardi’s for the show.
From oils and acrylics to video works and woodcuts, some of the sculptures were made from found objects that had been forged together.
The hosts of the exhibition Marie and Peter Gagliardi spoke about the process of choosing the 350 artists from 60 countries to be included in the exhibition.
Peter said: “We are looking for innovation… it can range from pure talent, you know, from a traditional perspective, skill and talent, all the way through to avant garde ideas.
“Essentially it’s all about communication about art speaking [to you] and art being of objective high quality.
“We would like to think of some of our hearts displayed in how we have shown the work and how we’ve presented it, and how we’ve put it together.”
“The point is for people to have a journey of art, it has to look fabulous, and it has to feel stimulating.”
As Macdonald put it as he described his feeling towards painting: “I like to get it out as fast as possible so that the doubt monsters don’t get it, then tidy it up without losing that energy.
“If you tidy it up too much the energy dies.”
The exhibition took place from 16-20 July 2025.
Full list of award winners below:
1st Prize
Alan Macdonald – Euphorus, Oil on Linen
United Kingdom
London Art Biennale Award for Painting 1st Prize
Eric Jung
Sweden
London Art Biennale Award for Sculpture/Installation 1st Prize
Rimas Metlovas
Lithuania
London Art Biennale Award for Works on Paper 1st Prize
Rebecca Lyne
United Kingdom
London Art Biennale Awards for Digital work/Video 1st Prize
Toby MacLennan
United States of America
World Art Dubai Award
Rebecca Holton
United Kingdom
Chianciano Art Museum Award
Hugh Chapmam – United Kingdom
Agnieszka Cereda – Poland
Mariken Francisca Bleeker – The Netherlands
Marieluise Bantel – Germany
Roger Adamson – United Kingdom
Yuan Quan – China
Mary Whitlock – United Kingdom
Tanya Voltsinger – Israel
Jan van Luyn – The Netherlands
Francesco Stile – Italy
Marco Venturini – Italy
Nina Schjeide – Norway
Giorgia Santopadre – Italy
Marthe Roussel – France
Lesueur Allan – France
Matthew Ricci – Australia
Dorian Radu – United Kingdom
Aglaia Perrakis – Greece
Onnik – Bulgaria
Darby Vincent Alcoseba – Philippines
K Gorny – United Kingdom
Hisham Echafaki – United Kingdom
CROW – Germany
Benet Dalmau Alsina – Spain
Sofia Bianchini – Italy
International Confederation of Art Critics Award
Uki Otake – United Kingdom
David Agenjo – Spain
Emmanuel Junior Obigba – United Kingdom
Carmen Chami – United States of America
Louise Bird – United Kingdom
Arts Club Chianciano Award
Evie Gazet – United Kingdom
Lucie Crocro – Czechia
Mitchell Craig – United States of America
Carolynda Macdonald – United Kingdom
Chloe Cox – United Kingdom
Featured image credit: Rosie Beveridge
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