Lacey Prize – 2025
2025 Winner
Congratulations to Klondike Institute of Art and Culture, winner of the 2025 Lacey Prize!
Photo: Courtesy of Klondike Institute of Art & Culture
Klondike Institute of Art and Culture
Dawson City, Yukon
Klondike Institute of Art and Culture (KIAC) is a vibrant, member-driven centre for artistic and cultural exchange located at the edge of the Arctic in Dawson City, Yukon, on Tr’ondëk Hwëch’in Traditional and Contemporary Territory. KIAC cultivates creativity and connects community through a wide range of festivals, events, exhibitions, and arts education programs spanning film, music, visual, literary, and performing arts. KIAC was formed by the Dawson City Arts Society (DCAS), a community arts organization with the mission to enrich the quality of life in the Yukon through the advancement of art, culture and the arts-based economy. KIAC opened in 1999 by transforming an abandoned historic building into a multi-use artistic and educational gathering place. The KIAC building was gifted the Hän name, Dënäkär Zho, by the Tr’ondëk Hwëch’in Elders’ Council, which means “a house of mixed colours”.
Over the last 26 years, KIAC has evolved into a nationally recognized hub for contemporary art, creative arts education programs, and artist residencies. Through the ODD Gallery, Macaulay House Artist Residency, and festivals such as the Dawson City International Short Film Festival and Yukon Riverside Arts Festival, KIAC brings together local, national, and international artists. Together, these initiatives have made Dawson City an unlikely yet vibrant hub for contemporary art in Canada.
We were inspired to see the range of organizations striving in their own ways to keep the cultural pulse across the country lively and impactful, despite economic constraints. The finalists for this year's prize were selected for their outsized generosity and resilience, which shines through their commitment to artists, dynamic programming, and community-minded endeavours.
— The jury for the Lacey Prize 2025
2025 Runners Up
Hearth
Toronto, Ontario
Founded in 2019 as an artist-run space, Hearth aims to provide a context that values collaboration, experimentation, and community. Presenting exhibitions, performances, publications, workshops, and other experimental programming, Hearth is collaboratively operated by Rowan Lynch, Sameen Mahboubi, Philip Ocampo, and Benjamin de Boer, as well as guest curators.
As a structural element in the makeup of a house, and a tool providing warmth, light, and food; a hearth gathers us towards itself, and towards each other. Hearth aims to provide a reprieve from limitations imposed by many larger artistic operating bodies, and is committed to working towards an anti-oppressive, queer positive environment, and welcoming marginalized and racialized folks through programming that celebrates the work of a diverse range of emerging collaborators.
daphne
Montreal, Quebec
daphne is an Indigenous artist-run centre in Tiohtià:ke / Mooniyang / Montreal grounded in the Kanien’kehá:ka Ohén:ton Karihwatéhkwen [Thanksgiving Address] and the Anishinaabe Grandparent Teachings. Since 2019, daphne has become a vibrant hub for Indigenous creativity, dialogue, and community. Through exhibitions, residencies, gatherings, and mentorship, we support Indigenous artists at all stages of their careers and from across Turtle Island, building relationships rooted in orality, practice, and process. As we enter our seventh year, daphne continues to advance self-determined Indigenous arts, ensuring that ancestral knowledge and contemporary voices thrive together in a welcoming space of generosity, respect, and creativity.
Honourable
Mentions
The jury for the Lacey Prize 2025 was composed of Luther Konadu, artist, writer, curator and Director of C’cap - Centre for Cultural & Artistic Practices (formerly Blinkers) in Winnipeg, Treaty 1 territory; Josée Drouin-Brisebois, Director of National Engagement at the National Gallery of Canada; and artist Louise Lacey-Rokosh, representing the Lacey family. The jury also identified three additional centres, which they felt merited honourable mentions for the important work they are doing within their respective communities. Congratulations to:
With support from
