Schering Stiftung Award for Artistic Research

The Schering Stiftung Award for Artistic Research is a cooperation of the Schering Stiftung and the Senate Department for Culture and Social Cohesion. It is presented in collaboration with KW Institute for Contemporary Art. As a joint initiative combining public and private funding, the award aims to honor pioneers in the field of artistic research. The award honors international artists who have developed unique forms of knowledge creation through aesthetic means. It also aims to awaken public interest in artistic research and to show in what ways art contributes to knowledge production.

The Schering Stiftung Award for Artistic Research has grown out of the Schering Stiftung Art Award, which from 2005 until 2018 was presented every two years to an international artist. It has been presented in cooperation with KW Institute for Contemporary Art since 2009.

Former award recipients include Cornelia Renz (2005), Nairy Baghramian (2007), Renata Lucas (2009), Wael Shawky (2011), Kate Cooper (2014), Hiwa K (2016), and Anna Daučíková (2018). The award was redesigned in 2019 with the Senate Department for Culture and Social Cohesion, which in 2020 launched a funding program for artistic research that has received much attention in the contemporary art scene. The 15,000-euro award includes a solo exhibition at KW, for which the artist creates a new work as well as a publication. The first Award for Artistic Research was given to Rabih Mroué in 2020, and the second to Kameelah Janan Rasheed in 2022. Sung Tieu was the recipient of the third Award for Artistic Research in 2024.