BP Portrait Award 2019


Disappointing exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery of contemporary portraits shortlisted for the BP Portrait Award.

There were some lovely pictures in this show but this year it felt a bit thin, there were just 44 pictures, and I don’t like the use of a small gallery to show them as it doesn’t give the chance for the work to breathe or to give good vistas through the show.

I did like Didler Altmeyer’s huge self-portrait which luckily you were able to view across the room as it worked so well from a distance. I liked the wall of small pictures with the one I show here as the centre piece. By Massimiliano Pironti it was a stunning portrait of an old lady.  I also liked the third prize winner by David J. Eichenberg painted in oil on aluminium which had a wonderful glossy effect. 

Sometimes the stories were as good as the picture such as Jeff Midghall’s picture of his mother in the hospice that she had previously volunteered in called “ Doctor-Patient” and Marco Krauwinkel’s touching double portrait of two men, his father and his father’s male partner. 

Closes 20 October 2019

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