The A+C Awards
The A+C Awards were set up in 2003 to celebrate the exceptional quality of art and scholarship in religious art and design in the UK.
After an introduction from Canon Dr Paula Gooder, the Chairing judges presented the winners within each category. They first highlighted specific qualities in each nomination, and then explained the reasons behind their selection of the winning pieces.
As Chair of the Book Award judging committee, Chine McDonald praised the ‘experimental project’ that Kathryn R. Barush had undertaken in her ‘Imaging Pilgrimage’. Bryan Biggs, as Chair of the Art Awards judging committee, remarked on how Thomas Denny’s ‘East Window’ both ‘bursts with stories’, and showcases the ‘abundance of nature’. Gardner & Gardner, in their acceptance speech for their award for ‘Peacemakers’, shared how their piece - in addition to having a significant effect on the local community - had also left them changed, in a positive way.
THE A+C BOOK AWARD 2026:
WINNER:
Kathryn R. Barush
Imaging Pilgrimage: Art as Embodied Experience
Bloomsbury, 2021
@pilgrim_travels
HIGHLY COMMENDED:
Jonathan A. Anderson
The Invisibility of Religion in Contemporary Art
University of Notre Dame Press, 2025
@jonathan.a.anderson
THE A+C TEMPORARY ART AWARD 2026:
WINNER:
Gardner & Gardner
Peacemakers
Coventry Cathedral, 2022
@gardnerandgardner
@coventry_cathedral
THE A+C PERMANENT ART AWARD 2026:
WINNER:
Thomas Denny
East Window
St John’s Tisbury, 2025
@thomas_dennyart
Interview with BBC Wiltshire on 24/4/2026, at 2hr 24mins: bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m002v1js
