The art of portrait

I never was interested in the portrait art, until I went to BP Portrait Prize exhibition in 2005 and while I didn’t like all of the works, I found all of them interesting in one way or another. They made me think about different painting styles, choosing the best pose, dress and background to represent the sitter and how much thought and love had to go into the paintings to capture the individuality and character of every sitter. It was fun to compare my impressions of the painted person to the information about them in the little notes beside the paintings. Often I found myself wanting to find out more without feeling that the paintings needed more explanations (I’m not a big fan of art that requires A4 page of text to be understood).

So yesterday since Cat only slept for one hour in the morning and sun was shining I went to the National Portrait Gallery to check out this year completion. I think this year’s selection was more uniform and there was less variety (though it could be that my memories of 2004 aren’t 100% correct). But there are still many interesting works to admire and study and think about. I loved the works that won the first prize and the young artist award. My other favourites were Kate by Vicki White (how I miss having a spontaneous cup of coffee with friends), Redhead (self-portrait) by Amanda Hext (reminded me my sister's hair), Amelie by Cassandra Szekely, Organia by Anastasia Pollard and actually many more.

On the way back I decided to walk to Green Park station and found out that Royal Academy's Summer Exhibition is only on until 19th of August. Anyone wants to join Cat and I on the outing to it before it ends?