Guidelines for Applicants

Eligibility Criteria

1. The Golden Fleece Award is open to craft and visual artists living and working on the island of Ireland as well as Irish-born artists working overseas.
2. The Award is open to practising craft and visual artists at any career stage who can demonstrate existing artistic merit and expertise in their chosen field, plus the vision/plans to advance their work to a new level.
3. Applicants may only apply once per Award cycle - for example, if you have both an individual practice and a collaborative practice, only one entry in which you are a named applicant can be made in a given year.
4. Applications will not normally be considered from students undertaking full-time study, and the Award cannot be used to support fees for postgraduate/higher education or study.
   
5. The Award is intended for artists working in all forms of visual, craft and applied art. Makers using new technologies to support creative processes and hands-on making are welcome to apply.
6. Winners of the main Golden Fleece Award are not eligible to reapply, but winners of Commendation, Merit or Special Awards, and all other previous entrants, are welcome to do so.

Assessment Criteria

1. Applicants must demonstrate existing artistic merit and expertise in their chosen field, evidenced through submission of a set of images of work produced during the past 2 years (6 images are required, and illustrating their current artistic activity. Up to 3 moving-image or audio works may also be provided in support of a submission. (Any outsourced elements of video, sound, performance work, etc., should be identified in the accompanying descriptions).
2. Applicants must demonstrate their vision/plans to advance their work to a new level and/or in a new direction of creativity and craftsmanship through a short written statement about their work [max 300 words].
3. Applicants must demonstrate a specific financial need and show how the Award would assist them to advance their work over a limited period of time (1-2 years) [max 300 words]. A budget breakdown must be supplied [max 200 words].

Rules of Entry

1. Applications must be made online through the Golden Fleece Award application form.
2. Images submitted as part of the application process should be in JPEG format and each individual image should not exceed 5 MB in size. If submitting examples of moving-image or audio work, up to three URLs hosting individual video or sound files on streaming/sharing platforms (preferably YouTube or Vimeo) may be included with your application.
3. By applying for the Golden Fleece Award you consent, if you are shortlisted, to the Trustees of the Award using your name and the images and text you have submitted in the promotion (and not for any other purpose) of the Award on the Golden Fleece website, social media, in print and online articles, or in other promotional material.
   
4. Current members of the Award's Advisory Panel should NOT be used as referees by applicants.
5. There is no application fee for the Award.
6. The Trustees' decision will be final.
7. Tá fáilte riomh iarrataisí as Gaeilge.

The Golden Fleece Award normally consists of one or more major Awards, to which may be added smaller Merit / Commendation / Special Awards. The size of the award fund is usually in the region of €30,000. How the fund is divided among recipients and distributed in any given year is at the Trustees' discretion. In 2024, one Award of €10,000 will be made in each of the two categories: Visual Art and Craft + Applied Art.

The call for applications for the 2024 Golden Fleece Award closed at 5pm on Friday 24 November 2023. Shortlisted artists will be announced in February 2024, and the next call for applications will open in autumn 2024 for the 2025 Award.