CIFRA Award: Play It Forward
Our Statement
We are celebrating artists who will define the future — creators whose work can be seen as future recipes, shaping how we imagine, experience, and inhabit the world to come. Our focus is not on what simply breaks through the screen or captures fleeting attention. We seek work that challenges systems, redefines context, and proposes new ways of being together. Our selection is guided by diverse perspectives: we champion artists from all backgrounds, disciplines, and geographies. We aim to support their vision and amplify it globally, so that these ideas can reach audiences far beyond their immediate surroundings. That is why CIFRA Award is nomadic, traveling across the world to bring these voices into dialogue with new communities, new cultures, and new realities. At CIFRA, we are curating art for collective world-building, work that contributes to a better, more interconnected, more conscious future. This is about fostering art that doesn’t just reflect the world, but actively helps shape it, forging pathways for tomorrow, today.
Author
Commissioned by CIFRA
Winners
Berlin, POSITIONS Berlin Art Fair
Venice, Art Night Venezia
Barcelona, LOOP
Barcelona, LOOP
Criteria
CIFRA Award is nomadic, adapting its format and location with every edition. Several times a year, we honor the most compelling and forward-thinking works in media art — spanning a wide spectrum of genres, from video art and cyberart to game art, projection mapping, and beyond. Selected by an independent jury of curators and practitioners, the award highlights artists whose work stands out for its originality, emotional depth, and conceptual clarity. While the focus remains on the artists, we also acknowledge the role of curators, collectives, and galleries who help bring these works into public view — shaping how media art is seen, shared, and understood.
Jury
Head of Art at CIFRA, Chief Curator
Director of Culture and Exhibitions at Casa Asia
Curator, Art Critic
Curator, Vice-President of Warsaw Gallery Weekend, President of TUT Foundation
Founder of Galeria SENDA; Founding co-director of LOOP
Researcher and curator
Curator, founder of SOMA Art Berlin
Founding co-director of LOOP and Screen Projects
Сurator, author, and critic, Director of Arts at Duke Kunshan University
Curator, Cultural Manager, Director of CIVA Festival/SOUND:FRAME
Writer, Curator, Lecturer, Co-founder EXPANDED.ART
Researcher, Artist and Chief editor of Neural magazine
Formats
Special Prizes
Presented during events like LOOP Fair Barcelona, Ca’ Foscari Art Night, and POSITIONS Berlin Art Fair. These editions are curated directly — with no public application — and honor standout works presented within those contexts.
Open Call Editions
Hosted online and open to all eligible artists, each open call centers on a specific format or approach. A public application is required via CIFRA. To apply, artists must activate a profile with at least three uploaded works and a filled-in bio.
Eligibility
Artists aged 18 and above. All genres welcome, depending on the edition’s curatorial frame. The award favors:
Conceptual and technical originality
Emotional and aesthetic impact
Strong narrative or structural thinking
A sense of experimentation
Our partners
Funding & Support
CIFRA Award is part of a global ecosystem that supports artists, curators, and cultural practitioners. CIFRA helps artists bring their projects to audiences worldwide, earn royalties, and grow sustainable connections with the art community. The award is a way to highlight the most urgent stories and artistic visions of our time.
CIFRA Award offers:
A grant to create and promote a new artwork
International visibility through curated exhibitions and screenings
In-depth CIFRA storytelling: interviews, social media short formats, and editorial features support
Curatorial spotlight within CIFRA’s global network
Every award also includes a financial grant provided by CIFRA to help artists expand their practice — whether by developing new tools, collaborating internationally, or carving out time to create.
In Conversation: Artists & Jury