Cooper Union

Lucy Pan A’26 Named to the 2026 AXA Art Prize U.S. Shortlist

POSTED ON: July 22, 2026

Kia, 2023, oil on wood, 40 x 30 inches

Recent graduate Lucy Pan A’26 is one of 40 students named to the 2026 AXA Art Prize U.S. shortlist. Pan’s painting was selected by a jury from a field of nearly 600 submissions nationwide and will be featured in an exhibition that opens at the New York Academy of Art in November 2026. The annual competition honors emerging artists and celebrates innovative figurative work by undergraduate and graduate students. A top winner will be announced during the week of the exhibition.

Of her submission, Pan notes that she aims to capture the emotional relationship between painter and subject through portraiture.

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Founded by inventor, industrialist and philanthropist Peter Cooper in 1859, The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art offers education in art, architecture and engineering, as well as courses in the humanities and social sciences.
“My feelings, my desires, my hopes, embrace humanity throughout the world,” Peter Cooper proclaimed in a speech in 1853. He looked forward to a time when, “knowledge shall cover the earth as waters cover the great deep.”
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