Hepworth Wakefield announced as UK museum of the year by Art Fund

Date
10 July 2017

The Hepworth Wakefield has been announced as the winner of Art Fund Museum of the Year 2017. The institution has been awarded £100,000 in recognition of its work, the largest prize of its kind in the world.

The Yorkshire-based museum was selected by judges from a shortlist of five that also included the Lapworth Museum of Geography in Birmingham, the National Heritage Centre for Horseracing and Sporting Art in Newmarket, Sir John Soanes museum and Tate Modern, both in London. Each of the shortlisted museums receive £10,000.

Art Fund director and chair of judges Stephen Deuchar says: “The Hepworth Wakefield has been a powerful force of energy from the moment it opened in 2011, but it has just kept growing in reach and impact ever since. David Chipperfield’s building has proved a perfect stage – both for the display of collections and as a platform for a breathtaking sequence of special exhibitions, curated with determined originality by the talented curatorial team.”

The Hepworth Wakefield has seen visitor numbers grow 21% year on year and was praised for its “ambitious exhibitions programme including major retrospectives of Stanley Spencer and Martin Parr.”

You can learn more about the finalists here.

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Owen Pritchard

Owen joined It’s Nice That as Editor in November of 2015 leading and overseeing all editorial content across online, print and the events programme, before leaving in early 2018.

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