Tom Speedy

Read Spotlight on Tom Speedy
Tom Speedy graduated from Dundee in 2025 and was nominated by his tutor for our Emerging Art Prize. Alongside this, Speedy was awarded the RSA John Kinross Scholarship, has already held two solo exhibitions, and has been selected for RSA New Contemporaries in Edinburgh (2026).  He then stepped straight into serious company - his paintings were shown this autumn in Don’t Look Back at Unit London during Frieze week - a group exhibition including Tracey Emin, Gavin Turk, Polly Morgan, Richard Billingham, Thomas J Price, Richard Wilson, George Shaw, Mark Titchner, Caroline Achaintre, and other significant figures in contemporary art.

These are major early markers of recognition and momentum and for this reason, Speedy moves directly into our Masters section.

His canvases open into water-lit worlds. Saturated blues, drifting figures, horizons and pools - everyday gestures suspended in atmospheres that feel both familiar and dream-charged.

The work constellates a landscape of thresholds, shadows, crossings - silhouetted figures suspended between roles. A dream-logic where leisure becomes ritual, familiar acts become uncanny, and the unconscious is staged on water, fields, and skies.