The Dallas Art Fair (DAF) has announced its inaugural Dallas Art Prize, an award recognizing significant achievement in contemporary art.
John McAllister, a Massachusetts painter who graduated from the University of Texas at Austin in 1999, has been awarded $20,000 in unrestricted funds. His work will be featured in the booth of Los Angeles- and New York-based James Fuentes Gallery at the 2026 fair, with whom he has previously exhibited at the fair.
John Mcallister, “ablaze rapt chorus beaming,” 2025. Image courtesy of James Fuentes Gallery
In a press release, John Sughrue, DAF founder, said “This award is not about emerging potential alone, but about recognizing artists who are already shaping contemporary thought and who are poised to define how museums, audiences and histories will engage with art in the decades ahead. John McAllister will be a lasting influence in the art world not because his work demands attention, but because it quietly earns it.”
The fair will run from Thursday, April 16, through Sunday, April 19, at the Fashion Industry Gallery in downtown Dallas. As the Dallas Art Prize recipient, Mr. McAllister will be recognized at an exclusive annual Dallas Artist Honoree dinner, and will participate in a public artist talk at the Dallas Museum of Art (DMA) on Wednesday, April 15.
Mr. McAllister said, “Texas holds a very special place in my heart, because it is where I developed the certainty that I would be an artist. Attending the University of Texas and making frequent trips to Dallas to visit the museums had a huge impact on the early foundations of my practice and makes me all the more proud to receive this award.”
Following his studies at UT, Mr. McAllister attended the Art Center College of Design in Los Angeles, then launched a career that included four solo shows at James Fuentes Gallery from 2008 to 2011, followed by exhibitions in Geneva, London, Chicago, Brussels, Hong Kong, Paris, and Venice, among other locales. His work is in the collections of the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles, and the Rubell Family Collection in Miami.
Artists who have previously shown at the DAF in the past are eligible for the Dallas Art Prize. All participating artists are also eligible to be considered for the Dallas Art Fair Foundation’s Acquisition Fund, which sponsors the acquisition of artworks from the fair for the DMA’s permanent collection.
The DAF released its 2026 exhibitor list and other fair information in February.