Herbert Smith Freehills Portrait Award 2024: Meet the Finalists

Three artists have been shortlisted for the prestigious Herbert Smith Freehills Portrait Award 2024, which makes a welcome return to the National Portrait Gallery in 2024.

The Gallery’s celebrated painting competition returns for its forty-second year thanks to the support of new headline sponsor, Herbert Smith Freehills.

The three shortlisted portraits were selected from 1,647 entries from 62 countries, with 50 selected for final display. Entries were submitted anonymously and judged by a panel, which included the National Portrait Gallery’s Director, Dr Nicholas Cullinan OBE; visual artist, Barbara Walker MBE RA; sociologist and bioethicist, Sir Tom Shakespeare; actor and host of the podcast, Talk Art, Russell Tovey; and the Gallery’s Curator for Contemporary Collections, Tanya Bentley. The three shortlisted portraits are:

Zizi (2023) by Isabella Watling, Jacqueline with Still Life (2020) by Antony Williams Lying (2020) by Catherine Chambers

The Herbert Smith Freehills Portrait Award is one of the most important platforms for portrait painters. The highly competitive Award encourages artists over the age of 18 to focus upon, and develop, the theme of portraiture in their work. Since its inception, the competition has attracted over 40,000 entries from more than 100 countries and the exhibition has been seen by over 6 million people. It has a first prize of £35,000, making it one of the largest for any global arts competition. Following its display in the exhibition, the first prize-winning portrait will also be temporarily displayed in the National Portrait Gallery’s ground-floor History Makers space, which celebrates contemporary figures. The second prize winner will receive £12,000 and the third prize winner will receive £10,000. The Herbert Smith Freehills Portrait Award will also include a Young Artist Award, which will see a prize of £9,000 awarded to a selected entrant, aged between 18 and 30, profiling their talent and supporting career development. A new commission will also be awarded to one artist every two years. All artists chosen to exhibit in 2024 and 2025’s Portrait Award exhibitions will be considered for this commission, which has an increased value of £14,000.

The prizes and the artists selected for the Young Artist Award will be announced at the award ceremony on 9th July 2024. The artist commission will be announced at the award ceremony in 2025.

Shortlisted Artists

Isabella Watling for Zizi (Oil on canvas, 2205 x 2145mm)

Isabella Watling is a London-based artist who trained at the Charles H. Cecil Studios in Florence. Watling’s portraits are always painted from life, under natural light and to life-scale. Her work has been exhibited by the Royal Society of Portrait Painters and as part of The Portrait Society of America’s International Portrait Prize. Watling’s work was previously selected for the Portrait Award in both 2012 and 2014. She exhibited The Importance of Being Glenn and Gina and Cristiano respectively.

Zizi is a portrait of the artist’s friend, painted while the sitter was finishing a Master’s degree in Textiles. Portrayed wearing a shimmering, pale pink dress, with visible piercings and tattoos, the choice of outfit and the textures of different materials express Zizi’s personality. Between sittings, Watling would place the dress on a mannequin so that she could continue to work on painting the complex folds of the fabric.

Antony Williams for Jacqueline with Still Life (Egg tempera on wooden board, 1222 x 668mm)

Antony Williams trained at Farnham College of Art and Portsmouth University. Williams’ work has been publicly exhibited for over 30 years, including at the Royal Society of Portrait Painters, The Smithsonian Institute in Washington and most recently at Messums London. Williams work has previously been exhibited in the Portrait Award in 1995, 1998, 2005, 2007, 2010, 2014, 2015, 2017, 2018 and 2020, and his 2003 portrait of economist, philosopher and social thinker, Amartya Kumar Sen, was commissioned for the National Portrait Gallery’s collection.

Painted in Williams’ preferred medium, egg tempera, his shortlisted portrait depicts Jacqueline, a model with whom Williams has worked with for a number of years. This work combines the artist’s interest in still life with a portrait subject, painted in the artist’s studio. While the still life doesn’t relate to the subject in any specific way, Williams sought to create an interesting dynamic between the table, objects and the sitter to create an implied narrative.

Catherine Chambers for Lying (Oil on canvas, 765 x 1130mm)

Catherine Chambers is a London-based artist. She has strong ties to Ethiopia, where she used to live, and its inspiration can be found throughout her body of work. She has a degree in Drawing and Applied Arts from the University of the West of England Bristol, and her work has previously been exhibited at the Embassy of Ethiopia, at the Royal Academy of Arts’ Summer Exhibition and as part of the Football Art Prize at the Millennium Gallery in Sheffield. This is the first time her work has been selected for display as part of the Herbert Smith Freehills Portrait Award.

Lying depicts a friend of the artist, at their home in Lalibela, Ethiopia. The work explores vulnerability, with the sitter lying on a bed, seemingly drifting off to sleep while fully clothed in jeans and a beloved Arsenal football shirt. The artist notes that at the time of painting, to “Fly Emirates”, as emblazoned on the football shirt, could not have been more than a dream for the sitter.

I’d like to extend my congratulations to this year’s shortlisted artists for their resonant work, which I’m really looking forward to seeing hanging on the Gallery’s walls this summer. On behalf of my fellow judges, it was a joy to review such a high quality of submissions – a testament to the prestige of this important competition. Thank you to Herbert Smith Freehills for their long-standing and continued support of the Gallery, which has now – as headline sponsor of the Portrait Award – enabled us to showcase the work of 50 talented portrait artists.

Dr. Nicholas Cullinan OBE Director, National Portrait Gallery

Herbert Smith Freehills Portrait Award 2024, 11th July until 27th October 2024,
National Portrait Gallery

To submit their entries, artists were invited to upload a photograph of their finished painting to the National Portrait Gallery’s Competitions Portal. Successful entrants were invited to hand-deliver or courier their work to a venue in London for a second, physical round of judging. 50 works were then selected for inclusion in the Herbert Smith Freehills Portrait Award 2024. The prize winners will be announced at the award ceremony on Tuesday 9th July 2024. 

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