Colorothon Foundation welcomes you to Colorothon Open 2026 - a National Fine Art Contest - which invites original art from across India and recognizes the strongest work through a transparent, two-stage judging process. The contest carries a total prize pool of ₹1,00,000/- awarded across 5 winners. It also gives the opportunity to the Top 25 artists to exhibit their works at the renowned Kokoro Art Gallery in Lucknow for a fortnight!

The contest runs in 2 Stages -

1) In the first stage, artists submit photographs of their original work online. A jury of 3 judges shortlists the 25 strongest entries from across the country.

2) In the second stage, these 25 artists send their physical artworks to the Foundation, where the same jury judges the works in person before selecting the final winners, who are then invited to an All-Expenses-Paid Trip to Lucknow for their Felicitation & Exhibition Inaugural Ceremony .

Submissions Checklist

1) Registrations & Submissions Open - 17th August 2026

2) Fill the Registration form, once registered you will receive an acknowledgement email with key details

3) Submit your entries via email before 2nd October 2026 with a Proof of Process (emailed to submissions@colorothonofficial.com with your Entry ID in the subject line). To protect every honest artist, and to keep this contest fair, each submission email must contain some simple phone photos and short pieces of writing. No editing, equipment, or skill with a camera is needed. Please keep the whole email under 25 MB. Make sure your submission email contains all of the following -

i) 3 photographs of your artwork, each a normal phone photo not more than 5 MB in size: one showing the work at an early stage, one showing it near completion, and one showing the finished artwork placed beside a handwritten note. The note must be in your own handwriting and must show your full name, the words “Colorothon Open 2026”, and the date.

ii) A short-written statement of up to 100 words, in the body of your email, describing the artwork and how it was made, in your own words. This statement is read by the jury.

iii) A signed Originality Declaration, confirming the work is original, handmade, and free of any AI tools. You may attach a clear photo or scan of the signed form. The declaration form is available with the entry details in section 5 of the Rules & Regulations and will also be shared in the Acknowledgement email you receive on completing registration.

These requirements are not optional. An entry that is missing any of the above will not be screened. Honest artists have nothing to worry about; these steps simply record the natural process of making a painting by hand.

Event

Event