CVAN EM and QUAD are delighted to announce that Rita Pena has been selected as the recipient of CVAN EM's Bigger Bursary, delivered in partnership with QUAD, supporting emerging lens-based artists living in the East Midlands.
This exciting partnership brings together CVAN EM's commitment to artist development with QUAD's renowned expertise in contemporary photography and lens-based practice, creating a unique opportunity for an emerging artist to develop new work while receiving financial, curatorial and professional support.
As this year's bursary recipient, Rita will receive a £2,500 bursary from CVAN EM to support artist fees and production, alongside £2,000 of support from QUAD, including curatorial guidance, travel and accommodation. The bursary will culminate in a solo exhibition as part of QUAD's Montage Gallery programme, providing an important platform to present work to new audiences.
The collaboration marks an exciting step forward in our bursary scheme, supporting emerging artists across the East Midlands not only by offering financial investment but also meaningful opportunities for professional development, exhibition-making and public engagement.
We look forward to sharing more about Rita's journey over the coming months. Rita’s solo exhibition opens at QUAD's Montage Gallery in November 2026 as part of this exciting partnership.
Rita Pena is a Portuguese photographer and visual artist based in Nottingham, whose practice explores relationships between place, identity, memory and socio-political narratives through lens-based storytelling. Her work frequently engages with community contexts and examines how environments and cultural histories shape collective and personal identities. She develops projects through collaborative research, often combining documentary, conceptual and participatory photographic approaches. Rita’s work has a strong focus on analogue processes and the materiality of the work, which includes darkroom printing, book and frame making by hand. Rita’s artistic work looks to intersect photobook making and socially engaged photography practices, reinforcing the accessibility and circulation of community-generated narratives.
Rita has previously worked on The Meadows, a collaborative and community-embedded project documenting neighbourhood transformation and collective histories, demonstrating her ability to engage with socially complex environments through visual storytelling.
She is currently working on Parto Sem Dor/Notes on Portuguese-ness, an ongoing project examining the complexities and meaning of contemporary "Portuguese-ness" - from an inquiry into how cultural and nationalist identities are constructed and transmitted to her personal introspections on her relationship to her family and country.
She is also a volunteer at Sequence: Nottingham Centre for Photography and Social Engagement.
Image credit: Rita Pena.