Hyperallergic Writers Among 2026 Rabkin Prize Recipients
Contributors Damien Davis and Alicia Inez Guzmán are among the eight arts writers who received the award.
Eight arts writers have been selected as recipients of the 2026 Rabkin Prize, an annual award granted by the Dorothea and Leo Rabkin Foundation. The recipients, announced on September 10, hail from various fields of arts writing, including investigative journalism, cultural research around race, power, and democracy. Damien Davis, a Newark-based artist and educator, is among the winners, along with Alicia Inez Guzmán, Melaine Ferdinand-King, Tyler Green, Julia Halperin, Sarah Lewis, Jan Tumlir, and Kaelen Wilson-Goldie. Each recipient will receive an unrestricted sum of $50,000.
The Rabkin Foundation's executive director, Mary Louise Schumacher, praised the writers for their commitment to close attention, deep research, complexity, independent thought, and a long view. The foundation's independent jury selects the awardees, who all offer unique insights into the complex dynamics of the art world. Davis, for example, refuses to subscribe to the romantic mythos surrounding his career path and uses his writing to address issues such as the auction of artworks and the debt traps faced by art school students.
Guzmán employs investigative rigor to explore how museums can erase pre-existing community artworks, while Lewis and Tumlir use their platforms to engage in public discussions about matters of significant consequence. The winners will delve deeper into their work on the Rabkin Interviews podcast, which will be published on various platforms starting on September 16. Founded in 1999, the Rabkin Foundation has disbursed over $4 million in award money since the prizes were established in 2017.
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