Three sculptors shortlisted to create Women's Prize for Non-Fiction trophy

Three sculptors - Jane Ackroyd, Ann Christopher and Lara Ritosa-Roberts - have been shortlisted to create The Charlotte, a bronze trophy to be awarded to each year’s winner of the Women’s Prize for Non-Fiction. The prize will be awarded for the first time in June 2024.

The Charlotte trophy will sit alongside The Bessie, which is given to each year’s winner of the Women’s Prize for Fiction.

A competition to create The Charlotte has been organised by the Charlotte Aitken Trust, a supporter of the new prize, in association with the Royal Society of Sculptors, with the judging panel chaired by Laura Ford, president of the Royal Society of Sculptors. Fellow judges were literary agent Clare Alexander and Charlotte Aitken trust trustee; Rachel Cugnoni, grants director of the Trust; novelist Sebastian Faulks, chair of the trust; and Kate Mosse, writer and founder director of both the Women’s Prize for Fiction and the Women’s Prize for Non-Fiction.

The winning sculptor will be announced in January, receiving a prize of £10,000.

Mosse said: "When we were launching the Women’s Prize for Fiction back in 1996, we were lucky to be gifted a cast of The Bessie by the sculptor and artist Grizel Niven. Now, nearly 30 years later, as we launch our sister prize, there will be a companion piece created by a contemporary artist and I cannot wait to see both works of art side by side! It is a wonderful moment of the past and the present working together to celebrate and honour women’s creativity in both literature and art."

Cugnoni added: "It has been an enormous pleasure to work with the Royal Society of Sculpture to find the artwork for The Charlotte. We had a Bessie on the table in front of us throughout the judging process to remind us what The Charlotte will sit alongside. The brief to create a piece of art which hit the intersection between literature and the visual arts inspired some wonderful work from the entrants and we would like to thank all the sculptors who took part for their creative engagement."

Ford said: "We were delighted when, out of the blue, the Women’s Prize Trust approached the Royal Society of Sculptors to help commission The Charlotte... It was a wonderful fit, as female sculptors have played a leading role in our history over the past 100 years."

Jane Ackroyd FRSS has spent her life making sculpture, both figurative and abstract, producing many public and private commissions and with her work appearing in collections in the US, France, Switzerland, Italy and the UK. 

Meanwhile Ann Christopher RA FRSS became an elected member of the Royal Academy of Arts in 1980, a Royal Academician in 1989 and a Fellow of the Royal Society of British Sculptors in 1992. She has exhibited in London, New York and France. "Edge and Line" was her first solo exhibition in New York in 2019.

Finally, Lara Ritosa-Roberts MRSS is a London-based artist and lecturer, working within the fields of sculpture, installation and performance. She has participated in a variety of creative projects across the UK and Europe, including Lates at Tate Modern and Tate Britain; Rijeka2020 - the European Capital of Culture; City of Women Festival, Ljubljana; National Theatre’s "Watch This Space"; and the Whitstable Biennale.

The Women’s Prize for Non-Fiction is sponsored by family tree Findmypast and supported by the Charlotte Aitken Trust, which is funding the £30,000 prize money and a statuette named "The Charlotte" over a three-year period. An anonymous donor also made "a significant one-off contribution" to help establish the prize.