Eight Artists Honoured with 2026 Governor General’s Awards in Visual and Media Arts

The eight winners of the 2026 Governor General’s Awards in Visual and Media Arts were announced on 16 September. These awards, among Canada’s most prestigious in the arts, recognise outstanding achievements in contemporary visual and media arts, as well as fine craft. The recipients represent a range of disciplines and regions across the country.

The 2026 honourees include Chung-Im Kim, a textile artist and educator based in Cookstown, Ontario. Kim is the recipient of the Saidye Bronfman Award, which celebrates exceptional craft processes. As part of the tradition associated with this award, the Canadian Museum of History in Gatineau, Québec, will acquire either a single work or a series of works by Kim.

Roger Lee, an art historian based in Vancouver, received the award for outstanding contribution to contemporary visual arts, media arts, or fine crafts. Lee is recognised for his decades-long career shaping Asian and diasporic art history in Canada. He is also known as a collector and cultural advocate. His renowned collection of Yixing teapots reflects his approach, uniting aesthetic inquiry with cultural memory.

Other winners are Faye HeavyShield, a Kainai First Nations sculptor and installation artist; Carole Itter, a Vancouver-based artist and filmmaker; Zacharias Kunuk, an Inuk sculptor and filmmaker; Lyne Lapointe, a Québec-based artist; Marie-Jeanne Musiol, a Swiss-born, Gatineau-based multidisciplinary artist; and Skawennati, a Montréal-based Kanien'kehá:ka (Mohawk) artist.

Marie-Jeanne Musiol’s practice involves creating photograms, backlit works, and experimental videos using the luminous imprints of plants recorded in electromagnetic fields. A group of these images, collected in her series The Radiant Forest, function as a kind of virtual energy herbarium at the intersection of botany and electrophotography.

Each of the eight winners will receive a bronze medallion and a monetary prize of C$25,000 (approximately US$18,000). The Governor General’s Awards in Visual and Media Arts distribute up to eight awards annually: six for artistic achievements, one for an exceptional fine craft artist, and one for an outstanding contribution to contemporary visual arts, media arts, or fine crafts.

An exhibition featuring selected works by the 2026 Governor General’s Awards winners is scheduled to open at the Beaverbrook Art Gallery in Fredericton, New Brunswick, on 7 November. This exhibition will provide the public with an opportunity to engage with the work of these celebrated Canadian artists.