Morgan Quaintance and Onyeka Igwe have been jointly awarded the 2025 Film London Jarman Award. The £10,000 prize will be split equally between the two.
Both artists were selected from a shortlist which also included Arwa Aburawa and Turab Shah, Karimah Ashadu, George Finlay Ramsay and Hope Pearl Strickland.
London-born and based artist Onyeka Igwe works with film, sound, text and performance to ask questions about how we live together, through history and politics. Her work draws on research into overlooked histories and engages with the politics of anti-colonial resistance as well as her own family history, often looking into the connections between Britain and Nigeria, with a particular focus on the propaganda work of the British government’s Colonial Film Unit.
Also born and based in London, artist, writer and musician Morgan Quaintance works across multiple media to produce layered experimental films. His work is guided by an editing process that includes loops, breaks and jolts, and brings together disparate material to draw viewers to unexpected places.
‘Both artists have produced significant bodies of work and consistently push the boundaries of what filmmaking can do’, said the jury in a statement. ‘We are delighted that the Jarman Award can recognise both artists at a landmark moment in their respective careers, to celebrate the breadth and vitality of two distinct approaches to the moving image.’
The work of all shortlisted artists is on view at the Whitechapel Gallery, London, through 14 December.
Morgan Quaintance and Onyeka Igwe’s work will be presented at the Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin, from 27 November – 10 December.
Read next the 10 exhibitions to see in November 2025
