2025 Beauchamp Prize in Critical Art Writing
Ends on
Gulf Coast is now accepting entries for the 2025 Toni Beauchamp Prize in Critical Art Writing.
Established in 2017, the Toni Beauchamp Prize in Critical Art Writing provides a platform for the thoughtful exchange of ideas in visual arts scholarship, criticism, and research. Named in honor of Toni Beauchamp—board president of Art Lies from 2002 to 2004 and a lifelong supporter of the arts in Houston and across Texas—the prize celebrates her legacy by supporting emerging and mid-career writers who demonstrate a distinctive voice, combine scholarship with journalistic insight, and exemplify literary excellence.
The prize invites submissions of expository writing, scholarly essays, and exhibition reviews written or published within the past year. The 2025 Toni Beauchamp Prize awards $3,000 to the first-place recipient and $1,000 each to two runners-up. The winning essay will be published in Gulf Coast’s print journal.
This year’s judge is Natalie Hegert, an award-winning writer, curator, and arts editor at Southwest Contemporary. Based between Lubbock, Texas and Colorado Springs, Colorado, she is also co-founder and director of the artist-run space CO-OPt Research + Projects in Lubbock. Her writing appears in Southwest Contemporary, Glasstire, Elephant Magazine, Artsy, ArtSlant, THE SEEN, Huffington Post, and ArtCritical, among others. She has also contributed essays, reviews, and op-eds to Papersafe Magazine, Dazed, Brooklyn Rail, Rhizomes, Photography and Culture, and various exhibition catalogues and artist books.
GUIDELINES:
- Submit one piece of critical art writing, of no more than 1,500 words, in a single .doc, .docx, or .pdf file.
- Submissions may include previously unpublished work or work published within the past year.
- The contest will be judged blindly, so do not include your name or contact information in the uploaded document.
- If selected, writers are responsible for securing image permissions and, if applicable, reprint rights for previously published work.
- There is no entry fee.
Submission Deadline: September 14, 2025