Villa Romana Prize 2027: Four Artists Appointed as Fellows

A New Cohort at the Historic Florentine Residency

The Villa Romana Prize has formally announced its latest cohort of recipients, continuing a legacy that stretches back to the early twentieth century. Established in 1905, the award remains Germany's oldest institutional accolade for visual artists. Rather than functioning merely as a monetary grant, the fellowship operates as an immersive residency model designed to cultivate independent creative trajectories away from commercial pressures. This year's selections reflect a deliberate curatorial strategy prioritising interdisciplinary methodologies and globally engaged research.

Navigating the Selection Framework

Director Elena Agudio, alongside project coordinator Mistura Allison, oversaw the nomination phase. A curated panel contributed recommendations, featuring practitioners such as Nevin Aladağ, Nora-Swantje Almes, Çağla İlk, Cosmin Costinaș, Nico Anklam, Florence Thurmes, Armin Linke, Rossella Biscotti, Kasia Fudakowski, and Willem de Rooij. The final shortlist underwent rigorous evaluation by jury members Ulf Aminde and Kathleen Reinhardt, whose collective expertise spans performance, film, and critical theory.

Examining the Selected Practices

Four creators have been appointed as fellows for the forthcoming academic cycle. Their individual investigations demonstrate a shared interest in destabilising established categories, whether through bodily autonomy, migratory narratives, or cross-cultural hybridity.

Arijit Bhattacharyya operates across multiple formats, currently developing a fictional narrative centred on symbiotic biological shifts between flora and humanity. The project interrogates contemporary authoritarian rhetoric, state-sanctioned coercion, and organised hostility. By partnering with grassroots reporters and civic activists, the work generates alternative archives through video and print media, effectively constructing counter-histories against dominant political discourses.

Stephanie Comilang, based between Toronto and Berlin, examines displacement and shifting geopolitical scales. Employing a self-defined documentary science-fiction framework, her cinematic outputs weave polyphonic perspectives that examine how populations navigate transnational mobility, financial flows, and precarious employment. The resulting films resist singular authorship, instead positioning viewers within complex networks of globalised labour and cultural exchange.

Ligia Lewis functions simultaneously as dancer and choreographer, constructing performances characterised by kinetic vigour and satirical undertones. Her methodology utilises corporeal expression to destabilise conventional anatomical paradigms while tracing residual historical imprints. Through affective resonance and embodied cognition, she translates intangible psychological states into tangible movement vocabularies, challenging normative frameworks surrounding physical capability and heritage.

Li Yong Xiang, anchored in Berlin, explores the permeable boundaries separating sculpture, painting, audio composition, and moving image. Drawing upon reciprocal cultural frameworks, his interventions deliberately blur formal classifications to question territorial sovereignty and entrenched hierarchies. The resulting works function as deliberate contaminations of medium and tradition, inviting audiences to reconsider fixed notions of artistic ownership.

Institutional Continuity and Public Access

Administered by the non-profit Villa Romana e.V., the initiative receives primary backing from the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media since 2021, alongside contributions from the Deutsche Bank Foundation and BAO Foundation. The residency continues to serve as a vital incubator for experimental work, bridging historical European traditions with urgent contemporary concerns. Previous residents will host studio visits across the nineteenth and twentieth of September 2026, offering public access to ongoing research and site-specific developments.