As Long as the Lights are On

As Long as the Lights Are On was shortlisted for the Football Art Prize 2026 and exhibited at the Millennium Gallery in Sheffield before joining the exhibition at the National Football Museum in Manchester. More importantly, it celebrates something often overlooked in football: the loyalty of supporters, volunteers and communities who gather beneath the floodlights week after week.

This isn’t about a match result or drama, but about the fact that, no matter what else is going on, someone is always playing somewhere. Training sessions, kickabouts, midweek fixtures; life continuing quietly under lights. People turn up in the cold, beneath imperfect floodlights, to keep something alive: habit, community, selfhood.

There’s no crowd, no ceremony; just players moving through the glow as the night closes in. Framed by houses and trees, the game continues not for spectacle, but because it always has.

Football played for as long as the lights are on.

Originally inspired by a photograph taken at Stafford Rangers FC, the painting was shortlisted for the Football Art Prize 2026 and exhibited at Sheffield's Millennium Gallery before touring to the National Football Museum in Manchester.

Following the exhibition, Stafford Rangers supporters began ordering prints of the painting, allowing it to return to the club and the community that inspired it. The original artwork was subsequently acquired by a lifelong Stafford Rangers supporter who has attended matches at the ground for almost 60 years. Reflecting on the work, he wrote: