Kapwani Kiwanga wins the Joan Miró Prize for his reflective and sensual installations

French-Canadian artist Kapwani Kiwanga has received the 2025 Joan Miró Prize for her formally diverse and thoughtful body of work. The jury considered that the artist "has carefully formalized the historical and social events that have shaped contemporary realities." According to the jury members, her installations are "provocative presentations that invite reflection, yet are formally sensual."

The jury, composed of Hoor Al Qasimi, Marko Daniel, Jorge Díez, Pablo Lafuente, Ann-Sofi Noring, and Marie-Helene Pereira, awarded the €50,000 prize to an artist who stands out for her exquisite treatment of the textiles, ceramics, and materials she typically works with, as well as her use of color and space within her installations. Kinawaga always seeks to connect with and delve deeper into the local histories she references in her works. "Her work is very beautiful. She plays extraordinarily with the relationship between exterior and interior spaces, with a great sense of design and architecture. Furthermore, the permeability of the materials she works with is very powerful," said Marko Daniels, director of the Miró Foundation.

Kinawaga was born in Hamilton, Canada, in 1978. An expert in anthropology and comparative religion, her work is driven by research into the marginalized and forgotten histories of the peoples she chooses to portray. "I don't know if anything inspired me to be an artist. I was more looking for languages ​​with which to express myself. First I tried academia, then film, and I came to art as a last resort, but there I found the ultimate vehicle to say what I wanted to say," the artist commented after receiving the award.

His work was already on display at the Macba , and five years ago he did some performances in Barcelona, ​​but his large-scale works have yet to be seen in Spain, at least in depth. "The role of the artist is very varied. For me, it's simple, but important. I want to provide tools to feel, think, and look at reality differently. Not to become static and complacent, but to seek new perspectives with which to confront reality. That's why I believe art should be part of everyone's daily life," Kiwanga asserted.

Next year, the artist will present a major exhibition at the Miró Foundation in which her works will engage in dialogue with the museum's spaces, as well as with the Catalan artist's work. "I don't know what I'll do yet. The truth is, I'm a last-minute person. I usually start with a question, then I research, investigate, and little by little, the way to express these questions emerges. I give myself complete freedom to let the works be what they need to be. The only thing I know about what I'll do at the foundation is that architecture will play an important role and that the work will engage with the sociopolitical and cultural reality of the space," the artist acknowledged.

For Kiwanga, Joan Miró has always been a reference, and she knew his works long before learning his name. This recognition allows her to feel that the direction of her work makes sense, and she admits to being able to join the community of artists who have won in the past, such as Ignasi Aballí, Roni Horn, Pipilotti Rist, and Olafur Eliasson . "When you start out, you wonder if you'll make it, if you'll be able to pay your bills, and this award only reaffirms the path you've decided to take," she says.

Kiwanga's work has been seen around the world. In 2023, she received a Guggenheim Fellowship and the Zurich Art Prize. She has also received the Marcel Duchamp Prize , the Frieze Art Award, and the Sobery Art Award. In 2014, she represented Canada at the 60th Venice Biennale. "I studied anthropology to escape the Eurocentric gaze and seek new forms of expression. From there comes my need to show the multiplicity of points of view on which we all converge," the artist concluded.