Laure Prouvost has won this year’s Turner Prize for her video installation set in a mocked-up tea party.

The video installation – called Wantee – by the London-based French artist was lauded by judges as outstanding and moving.

The award, which earns the winner STG25,000 ($A45,135), was given by young Irish actress Saoirse Ronan, who received Academy Award, BAFTA and Golden Globe Award nominations for her role in the 2007 film Atonement.

The world-famous exhibition was held in the first ever UK City of Culture, Londonderry, Northern Ireland, and is the first time it has been staged outside of England.

“Thank you for adopting me, for having a French one, I feel adopted by the UK,” Prouvost said.

Wantee shows artwork created by a central character of the film, Prouvost’s fictional grandfather, being used for domestic duties by his wife. It symbolises how an artist who dreams of his work being displayed in books and galleries loses control of it and ultimately it has an unglamorous fate in the household.

The video is a response to the artist Kurt Schwitters and opens with the question: “Would you like some tea?”

The title is Wantee because Schwitters’ girlfriend was nicknamed Wantee as she repeatedly asks “want tea”.

Four artists – Prouvost, Tino Sehgal, David Shrigley and Lynette Yiadom-Boakye – were in contention for the award.

Established in 1984, the Turner Prize is awarded to a contemporary artist under 50, living, working or born in Britain, who is judged to have put on the best exhibition over the last 12 months.