A couple of weeks ago, I returned to London for the Derwent Art Prize 2026, held at the Oxo Gallery from 9 to 19 April. More than 5,000 entries were submitted, and 71 artworks were shortlisted for the exhibition. Mine was one of them. That alone made the experience meaningful.
London is a city that still feels deeply familiar to me. I lived there for years, and going back with a different life and a different artistic identity carried a quiet emotional weight. It did not feel like revisiting a former chapter. It felt more like standing for a moment between two versions of myself and recognising that both belonged to the same story.
The work I submitted, Soffermati, was made on canvas rather than paper. That decision mattered from the beginning. Linen does not absorb graphite in the same way paper does. Its roughness interrupts precision, takes in detail unevenly, and resists the temptation to control everything. For me, that resistance was not a problem to solve, but part of the work itself.
Soffermati borrows something from the visual language of fashion photography, but I did not want a polished image or a fixed narrative. I wanted a suspended moment, something precise enough to hold attention, yet open enough to remain unresolved. The canvas helped me move away from extreme realism towards an image with a softer, more distant quality, like a memory or an old photograph whose meaning has never been fully explained.
This is one of the reasons I continue to return to drawing on canvas. It allows me to hold on to the language of drawing while working against a surface that resists complete control. That resistance matters to me. It forces decisions. It simplifies. It asks for another kind of precision, one that depends less on detail and more on presence.
Seeing Soffermati installed at the Oxo Gallery gave me a new understanding of the work. The gallery sits on the South Bank inside Oxo Tower Wharf, in a part of London shaped by the river, heavy foot traffic, and a strong architectural presence. When I returned on a quieter day, I spent time looking at the position chosen for my artwork. It had been placed against the front glass wall, visible from outside as well as from within the exhibition. I felt humbly honoured by that choice. With 71 shortlisted works in the show, that placement suggested an immediate visual presence, and I did not take that lightly.
What stayed with me most, however, was not the result of the competition. It was the level of drawing surrounding me. There were artists with extraordinary command of graphite, charcoal and coloured pencil, each pushing the language of drawing in a different direction. Some works were technically virtuosic. Others were quieter, more atmospheric, or more conceptual. What struck me was not one particular style, but the breadth of intelligence behind them. The exhibition reminded me that drawing is not a narrow discipline at all. It is a vast one, shaped by discipline, sensibility, risk and point of view.
That was the real lesson I took home from London. An art prize like the Derwent Art Prize is also part of a larger conversation about the medium itself. It affirms that drawing still matters, that it continues to evolve, and that many brilliant artists are using it to explore very different ideas, atmospheres and subjects. To have Soffermati included in that conversation meant a great deal to me. Recognition is one part of what a prize can offer, but a strong exhibition offers something else as well: perspective. It shows you where your work stands, what makes it distinct, and where you still want to go next.
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Note: This blog article was originally written in English. Other language versions are automatically translated to make the content accessible.
