If chosen for the Dover Prize, the £10,000 bursary would allow me to develop a new body of work that challenges my current framework and opens up a more personal mode of research. I am an emerging artist at a pivotal point in my career, having recently gained international recognition through exhibitions, publications, and representation by Steve Turner in Los Angeles. My work is grounded in a rigorous oil painting practice exploring masculinity through male characters in film – often isolated, turned away, or caught in moments of uncertainty. As a trans-masculine person, I’m driven by curiosity around how masculinity is performed, and where it fractures.
I typically paint from film stills, but I am proposing a major shift: creating my own moving image as source material. This would allow me to foreground personal experience in a way that hasn’t yet been possible in my practice. The project builds on research from my 2023 solo-exhibition ‘Last Dance’ at Grove Gallery in London, where I began exploring masculinity through the lens of my Dad. One piece from the show, ‘Fishburn’, depicts a motorway bridge in County Durham, tied to a formative moment from his youth. Our shared, but distinct, experiences of masculinity – his shaped by growing up in the North East – form a natural next step in my practice.
With the bursary, I would undertake a research trip to the North East with my Dad – part research, part pilgrimage – collecting footage, stories, and reflections that will inform a new body of paintings. Making my own film to extract stills from would be a key development, introducing a new intimacy and my own unique voice.
The funding would support my studio rent, travel and accommodation, materials, and provide an artist fee – giving me the space and time to commit fully to this new direction. I would document the process through writing and video, which may become part of the final presentation or remain as research. This project would mark a major turning point in my practice, allowing me to deepen both form and content in ways that feel vital and long overdue.
As a represented artist with a growing international profile, the Dover Prize offers a meaningful opportunity to create new work rooted in both personal and regional history, while bringing greater visibility to Darlington’s creative scene. Currently I mostly exhibit outside of the UK, and I would cherish the opportunity to share work in a place I have a strong connection to. Through my gallery, networks, and press outreach, I would spotlight Darlington as a vital site for contemporary art. In addition to exhibiting, I would offer public engagement through workshops, talks, and potentially screenings – engaging with local audiences, to make space for connection and conversation.
Though I’m from Milton Keynes, my Dad is from Fishburn, and I spent much of my childhood in the North East, including Darlington. Returning with intention, I want to produce work that reflects the emotional and cultural significance of the area. My practice is rooted in film, and as part of this project I will research artists and filmmakers with similar concerns – for example Ken Loach, whose film ‘Kes’ my Dad loves and strongly associates with his childhood. Our shared connection to ‘Kes’ will be a catalyst for conversation and research that underpins the work.
In my oil paintings of film stills, figures often take up space on the canvas through an intentionally uncomfortable crop. The starting point for my work is usually a small, seemingly insignificant detail I notice while watching a film. These moments are distilled into screenshots, which become drawings, and then paintings. It’s a process of removal – I’m not interested in directly replicating a scene but in capturing and translating the initial feeling that struck me. My approach is intuitive; I seek small moments of playful intervention and let the material lead. Working thickly, each painting is built up in layers over several days. I reference the surface of a cinema screen through fields of colour, carved into with strong line – my hope is that when finished the paintings feel alive. In my MFA thesis I explored Roland Barthes’ theory of the ‘punctum’, which is defined as “a small, distinct point.” It refers to an incidental but personally poignant detail in a photograph that “pricks” a particular viewer, recalling a private meaning unrelated to any cultural code. Applying this theory to film, these small punctures are what I’m exploring in my practice, and with this project I hope to delve into the personal meaning that drives them by excavating my own history – expanding the ‘punctum’ from a pinprick to the whole sky. In recent years I have focused primarily on monolithic male characters. The men I paint are often harbingers of their own downfall – in my April 2024 solo-exhibition ‘Number One Fan’ in Los Angeles, I explored the characters Rupert Pupkin and Jerry Langford from ‘The King of Comedy’. In November 2024 my solo-exhibition ‘Never Cursed’ at Moosey in Norwich explored optimism in the face of constant failure through the lens of various male film characters. Both shows shared a similar theme, of striving for something that feels just out of reach and the ways we self-sabotage to maintain control. I’m repeatedly drawn to the performance of masculinity, its weight, and its inevitable failures. I am eager to see if this can still be found by turning the lens onto myself.
Yes, I completed my BA (Hons) in Fine Art at Goldsmiths, University of London in 2016. I then completed my MFA in Fine Art at Glasgow School of Art in 2022.
Yes, I received the Wardens Purchase Prize in 2016 when completing my BA (Hons) at Goldsmiths. The Warden of Goldsmiths chooses a piece of work from the Fine Art Degree Show to buy for the university’s permanent collection.
Yes, my work has been reviewed and featured in multiple publications. My solo-exhibition in Glasgow, ‘The Folder’, was reviewed as a Critics’ Pick on Artforum’s website in 2022. I have been featured multiple times on Juxtapoz Magazine’s website, and an interview with me was featured in their printed Fall 2024 issue. I was also interviewed on their Radio Juxtapoz podcast in 2024. Most recently I was featured in the new issue of TheWrapBook, published in 2025, in their Artists by Artists campaign. Links to these can all be found in the CV section of my website.
Yes, I am represented by Steve Turner in Los Angeles. I gained representation in November 2024 after my first solo-exhibition ‘Number One Fan’ with the gallery in April 2024. I have also previously shown works with Steve Turner as part of Untitled Art Fair in Miami in 2023.
Yes, I took part in the Moosey Residency with Moosey Gallery in Norwich in June 2024. I lived in Norwich for a month alongside three other artists, with access to a shared studio. I spent my time on the residency researching film, developing drawings and experimenting with new methods of painting. This culminated in a body of work which was on view to the public in an open studio event at the end of the residency.
Email: hannahrosewilson@outlook.com
Address: 3/2 230 Calder Street, Glasgow, Lanarkshire, G42 7PF, GB
Local Authority: Glasgow City
