Voting will open on February 19 for Museums at Night's hotly-contested Connect10 competition. Here we introduce the 38 museums and galleries hoping to win one of ten artists for a special Museums at Night event.

The online public vote, hosted by Culture24, will also offers voters the chance to win tickets to the events during the weekend of May 16 - 18.

Here are the ten artists and the venues hoping to host them...


Jake and Dinos Chapman

What more can you say about the Chapmans? One from an idiosyncratic quartet of venues will host the notorious duo.

Bart's Pathology Museum (London), the new Jerwood Gallery (Hastings), the Museum of London (taking over the world’s largest archaeological archive) and Cheltenham Art Gallery (in the Gloucestershire town where the artists went to school) are the four.

Mat Collishaw

A photographer and video innovator known for his images of beauty and cruelty, four wonderful venues are hoping to entertain Mat Collishaw.

The Anglican Cathedral, in Liverpool, is the largest of its kind in the country, and Northern Print, in Newcastle, has an award-winning home which was once part of a famous pottery. Landhydrock House is a Victorian estate in Bodmin, and Backlit, in Nottingham, has a close affiliation with Collishaw's former stomping ground, the city's Trent University.

Martin Creed

Best known for his 2001 Turner Prize winning The Lights Going On and Off, Martin Creed will be heading to one of two London venues.

The Freud Museum and The Ragged School Museum should both make fantastic hosts.




Cullinan and Richards

The London-based artistic collaboration of Charlotte Cullinan and Jeanine Richards will be heading to one of four venues.

London's Museum of Brands, Olney's Cowper and Newton Museum, the cinematic QUAD in Derby and the 20-21 Visual Arts Centre in Scunthorpe make for an eclectic list of possible destinations.


Susan Forsyth

Shortlisted for the Jerwood Sculpture Prize in 2009, Susan Forsyth has four museums vying for her attentions.

The Victoria Gallery and Museum, at the heart of the University of Liverpool, and the Rochdale Pioneers Museum, where the co-operative movement began. Two Yorkshire favourites - Sheffield's Kelham Island Museum and Yorkshire Sculpture Park, near Wakefield, will also want your vote.

rAndom International

Rain Room, rAndom international’s recent installation at Barbican offered visitors an immersive experience through rainwater - what will they create in one these four venues?

The picturesque Horniman Museum and Gardens, 19th century London ship the SS Robin, Derry's riverside Void Gallery and Unviersity College London's Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology are all aiming to come top of the poll.

Gavin Turk

Sculptor and installation artist Gavin Turk rose to prominence as one of the infamous Young British Artists - he'll be appearing at one lucky venue from four.

18th century hospital the Foundling Museum in London, the history-hopping Time Machine Funtington in Chichester, the Egyptology epicentre that is Bristol Museum and Art Gallery and the Georgian pleasure grounds of Bath’s Holburne Museum all bid for Turk.  

Julia Vogl

A recent winner of the Aesthetical Art Prize and the Catlin Art Prize, Vogl has shown as part of the New Sensations exhibition, and was commissioned to make work for The People's Supermarket.

Geological roundhouse The Rotunda Museum in Scarborough, Gloucester City Museum and Gallery (home to a Science School 150 years ago), Newcastle’s towering Discovery Museum and Bristol’s open-air Arnos Vale Cemetery look to provide the architectural splendour for Vogl’s conceptual mastery.

Richard Wentworth

Artist, curator and teacher, Richard Wentworth has helped to alter traditional definitions of both sculpture and photography.

Three historic venues - Gloucester Folk Museum, Shandy Hall in York and Dragon Hall in Norwich - hope to welcome him. But he could be set for a multi-venue night in the north-west, where Manchester Museum, Manchester Art Gallery and the Whitworth Art Gallery are tabling a joint bid.

Julian Wild

Shortlisted for the Jerwood Sculpture Prize in 2005, Julian Wild has exhibited in a range of spaces including the Victoria & Albert Museum.

Four of the country's most hallowed historic sites have sculptural designs on him: The Ironbridge Gorge Museum in Telford and The Old Assembly Rooms in Newcastle are both Grade II-listed; the Gladstone Pottery Museum, in Stoke, is one of the country's only remaining bottle kilns, and the Corinium Museum, in Cirencester, has a celebrated Roman collection.

• Museums at Night 2013 takes place in hundreds of museums, galleries and heritage sites across the UK during the evenings of Thursday, Friday and Saturday, May 16-18.

• The Connect10 competition is supported using public funding by the National Lottery through Arts Council England.