Art Competition 2026-27

Welcome to our competition page! Every year, we ask young people to create art that looks at the great things and the challenging things about personalised medicine. 

In the fifth year of the competition, we’re looking at talking to family about health and genetics. 

Sometimes, personalised medicine involves tests that find strong genetic risk factors that might run in families. For example, a person with a heart problem might have tests to explore why this happened, and this might show they have a genetic risk factor that made them much more likely to have heart problems. 

Where this happens, people are often asked to share information about the genetic risk factor with their family. This is because other people in the family might also have the genetic risk factor. If they know they have it, there might be extra health checks or things they can do to help them stay healthy. If they don’t know about it, they might miss out on this and maybe only find out they have the genetic risk factor when they become very unwell. 

Research shows that people who know they have a strong genetic risk factor often want to share this information with their family, but it’s the sort of thing that’s hard to tell people. They might feel unsure what to say, or find it difficult to find a good time. 
 

We would like you to create art about sharing genetic information in families. You could do this on your own, or as part of a team (e.g. as an art club or youth group). 

To give you some ideas, your art could look at: 

We can’t wait to see what you create! Please click on the headings below for more details.

  • You can make a drawing, a painting, a photograph, a collage, a sculpture – we’re excited to see what you come up with! It needs to be something that you can take a photograph of (so it can’t be a piece of music or a video, for example). 
  • The art must be your own work. If you use pre-existing material (e.g. to make a collage), think about whether you might need permission to use the material from the copyright holder. 
  • Any people in your art should not be identifiable. If you’re doing a picture involving a person, you should draw or paint someone from your imagination rather than a person you know in real life. 

Opens for entries: 1st September 2026 

Closes to new entries: 29th January 2027 at 5pm 

Winner and finalists announced: 24th March 2027 

  • You can enter the competition if you will be in Year 7, 8 or 9 of secondary school (England and Wales), P7, S1 or S2 (Scotland) or Year 8, 9 or 10 (Northern Ireland) on the 1st October 2026. 
  • Your school must be based in the UK, or if you are taught at home you must live in the UK. 
  • You can create art on your own or as part of a team (e.g. as an art club). 
  • The closing date for competition entries is 29th January 2027 at 5pm. Late entries will incur a penalty and may not be accepted. 

Please email a photo of the artwork to cpm@well.ox.ac.uk with subject line ‘CPM competition’ by 29th January 2027 at 5pm together with [this form completed by your parent/guardian/teacher]. 

Please keep your original artwork safe. If you are a competition winner we might ask you to send it to us for display or scanning (we would pay for postage). 

By entering the competition, you give the Centre for Personalised Medicine permission to share your artwork online and in person (including modified versions of the image, for example cropped versions). The artist’s first name, age when entering the competition, and school name (where provided) will be displayed together with the art. 

The judging panel will be comprised of members of the Centre for Personalised Medicine and their guests. 

The artworks will be judged on: 

  • Relevance – does the image communicate something important about sharing genetic information within families? 
  • Originality – does the image make you think about sharing genetic information within families in new or challenging ways? 
  • Artistry – does the image capture your attention and make you want to find out more? 

The judges’ decision is final. 

All artists who enter the competition will be sent a digital certificate via email. 

The best entries will be shared online by the Centre for Personalised Medicine, and may be displayed at future events held by the Centre, or form part of exhibitions. For example, winning entries from previous years have been displayed at the Churchill and John Radcliffe hospitals in Oxford, St Anne’s College, and are featured on our website, social media, and in reports relating to the work of the Centre for Personalised Medicine. Some of the best entries are on long-term display at the Centre for Human Genetics in Oxford. 

For individual entries, one overall winner will receive £100, one runner-up will receive £50, and highly commended entries will receive £10. For group entries, subject to scoring comparably to finalists in the individual entry category, one winning team will receive £100. 

  • Read this blog post about a public engagement activity around talking to family members about a strong genetic risk factor. 
  • Read this story about research trying to help families with sharing genetic information. 
  • Listen to this podcast episode where Julie, who has a genetic condition which increases her risk of cancer, talks about her experience of sharing this information with her family. 

Click here to download information for teachers about this year’s art competition. 

[Click here] to download a flyer promoting the competition that would be suitable for school noticeboards, newsletters, etc. 

Take a look at the amazing winners and finalists from previous years: 

Download entry form here