A Fine Art graduate of Painting, chosen for a prestigious national painting prize, will begin her art career with a ‘superb kickstart’ as a result.

Ruby Cascarina, who graduated at a ceremony last week, has been selected for the Freelands Painting Prize, which celebrates outstanding painting practice at undergraduate level.

She is the third student from Lancaster University’s Lancaster Institute for the Contemporary Arts (LICA) to be chosen for this national Painting Prize in five years.

The prize culminates in an exhibition at the Freelands Foundation gallery space in London in October.

Launched in 2020, the prize extends the Foundation’s ongoing support for artists, emerging practices and art education.

The Foundation invites every higher education institution in the UK that offers a BA Fine Art or Painting course to nominate a final year student to submit a work for the prize; either a painting or a work exploring painting in the expanded field.

The winning artists are selected by a jury.

LICA Fine Art Lecturer (Painting) Pip Dickens says: "Ruby was an automatic nominee for this Prize and we are thrilled that, out of some 48 participating institutions, she will be one of a handful of undergraduate winners exhibiting their work, probably for the first time, in a London venue. It's a superb kickstart to her art career.

"This is the third time a LICA student has won the Freelands Painting Prize. We are immensely proud of these outcomes given the Prize only launched in 2020."

Ruby, who hails from Letchworth Garden City, in Hertfordshire, chose to study at Lancaster because of the flexibility of the courses.

“I couldn't decide whether I wanted to study English or Fine Art and Lancaster offered a joint honours degree in Creative Writing and Fine Art so it was the perfect choice,” she explained. “After my first year I decided to go on to only study Fine Art but having that option was amazing.”

Speaking about her art practice she added: “I make oil paintings about the sublime - the acknowledgement or feeling of being insignificant within the wider contexts of the world.

“I submitted three paintings that articulate those ideas under the title 'How Long Is a Piece of String', referring to a string motif that appears in each of my paintings.”

“Given that the Freelands Painting Prize works by each university nominating one student, I was already really proud to be nominated by my tutors in the first place, so to be a winner was very exciting,” she explained.

And for Ruby, who was experiencing ‘art block’ at the time, the news she had been selected as a winner came at just the right moment.

“It was just the motivation I needed!”

She added: “My experience at Lancaster University has been really positive, the staff have been supportive and engaged with my progression throughout the course.”

Now, with her BA degree in hand, Ruby plans to rent an art studio and continue painting.