BP Portrait Award 2018, National Portrait Gallery, London

Portraiture is not the buzziest of art forms. Seen lately as high-minded and serious, it can can be oddly joyless. Smiles are rare, while wizened geriatrics and disenchanted, hard-faced youths abound. But the National Portrait Gallery's annual BP Portrait Award never fails to ruffles outdated feathers.

Spanish portrait painter Miriam Escofet wins the BP Portrait Award 2018 for An Angel at my Table, a portrait of her mother drinking tea. Escofet sees her portrait as an attempt to ‘transmit an idea of the Universal Mother, who is at the centre of our psyche and emotional world.’ This year, four portraits of familial love were in the running for the prestigious £35,000 art prize. The shortlisted artists, all nominated for First Prize, were selected from 2,667 entries from 88 countries around the world by a panel which includes journalist and broadcaster Rosie Millard and artist Glenn Brown.

Second prize was awarded to American artist Felicia Forte, for her colourful, vibrant portrait of her sleeping boyfriend, Matthew DeJong. Forte says she was struck by the unusual aesthetics of the scene at the time of conception – the ‘cool light from the window meeting intense red light from the bedside lamp and the loneliness of the sleeper amidst the festive colours.’



Ania Hobson, Detail: A Portrait of two Female Painters, 2017

Chinese artist Zhu Tongyao takes home third prize for Simone. Painted while Tongyao was studying at the The Academy of Fine Arts in Florence, Simone depicts the son of the neighbours who looked after him while there.

Suffolk-based Ania Hobson's portrait of herself with her sister-in-law, Stevie Dix, also a painter, wins The BP Young Artist Award. With its unusual perspective (see above), the portrait explores the complex relationship between Hobson and Dix as painters in the studio.

National Portrait Gallery Director, Dr Nicholas Cullinan, also Chair of the Judges, said that the 'BP Portrait Award is an annual celebration of contemporary painted portraiture by artists of all ages from across the world. [...]Judging anonymously requires each panel member to address precisely what they believe makes an outstanding portrait, weighing up the relative importance of technique, likeness, narrative, structure and the overall impact of a work through a lively process of debate and discussion'.

Now in its 39th year, the award aims to promote and support emerging and existing global talent. The exhibition always draws a variety of responses to the portraiture remit, with intensely human stories at the heart of the works.

All the winning portraits can be seen at the BP Portrait Exhibition, which opens on 14 June.