Looking Out, Looking In: Exploring the Self-Portrait

The exhibition ‘Looking Out, Looking In: Exploring the Self-Portrait’ considers the complex and fascinating genre of the self-portrait — a distinct form of portraiture in which subject and artist are one, here we examine the enduring human interest in the self-image, revealing artistic tendencies towards both introspection and flamboyance. ‘Looking Out, Looking In’ is devised…

The Archibald Prize: A Century of portraits

With the 2023 Archibald Prize recently announced, we delve into Australia’s oldest portrait award hosted by the Art Gallery of New South Wales. Since 1921 the prize has attracted National interest, controversy, court cases and continually sparks numerous debates, so to celebrate we’ve made a list of works from the QAGOMA Collection with a link…

Flamboyance that was distinctly modern

Though not a painting of a named sitter, George Washington Lambert’s Portrait group (The mother) 1907 (illustrated) nevertheless belongs to that category of art — Edwardian salon portraiture — which flourished in England in the first decade of the twentieth century. These were works especially characterised by flamboyance and bravura, where old master techniques were combined with…

Me, Myselfie and I, the art of self-portraiture

In the age of the selfie, self-portraiture continues to be a meaningful form of artistic expression. For hundreds of years, artists have created self-portraits as an intimate form of self affirmation, as a public statement about their identity, to showcase their skill, or to shape the way they are perceived. Such images are often self-conscious…

Albert and Vincent Namatjira

This work by Vincent Namatjira, a member of one of Australia’s most well-known artistic families, can be displayed beside the painting that inspired it, and will enrich the ongoing importance of its famous subject. Vincent Namatjira is one of the leading lights of the emerging generation of artists from remote central Australia. Namatjira is a…