The National Portrait Gallery US Competition

Its not quite up to the UK competition..and why??? Okay, I'll join up..I volunteer and what fun it would be, but lets get serious here we need a full blown competition with major funding. There's no reason that we can't find ( present winners aside) great portrait art, and we have to get to work on that.However, Kudos to the top three.



"Blog portrait competition winners Dave Woody of Fort Collins, Colorado has received first prize in the National Portrait Gallery’s 2009 Outwin Boochever Portrait Competition. His photograph titled “Laura” was chosen as the winner from a field of over three thousand entries. First prize was a cash award of $25,000 and a commission from the museum to portray a remarkable living American for the NPG permanent collection. The portrait by Dave Woody, as well as works from forty-eight other artists, are on display at the National Portrait Gallery, in the Outwin Boochever Portrait Competition exhibition on the second floor.



Of his work, Woody comments, “I am never really attracted to photographing subjects who are totally self-aware or self-confident, as I’m more interested in those people who move through this world with a quiet grace. Spending time with friends allows me to see them in a certain light where their mask drops and something soft and inviting is seen, and I’ll think of making a photograph of them.”





Second prize was awarded to Stanley Rayfield of Richmond, Virginia who submitted a painting titled “Dad.”






Third place went to Adam Vinson of Jenkintown, Pennsylvania. His oil-on-panel painting is titled “Dressy Bessy Takes a Nap.”

Commended artists are: Margaret Bowland, for a painting titled, “Portrait of Kenyetta and Brianna”; Yolanda del Amo, for her C-print photograph, “Sarah, David”; Gaela Erwin, for her pastel-on-paper, “Baptismal Self-Portrait”; and Emil Robinson for an oil-on- panel portrait titled “Showered.” Each was awarded a cash prize.

These works were finalists in the museum’s second national portrait competition. Of the entries submitted from across the country, forty-nine artists’ works were chosen for display in the exhibition; seven of these works were chosen for the short list. The competition received entries in every visual-arts medium.

NPG Director Martin Sullivan states, “The variety and depth of the entries was encouraging to me since it proved that portraiture is an ever-evolving genre. And best of all, this competition allows the National Portrait Gallery and its visitors to see how today’s artists interpret portraiture in all of its forms.”

Finalists for the 2009 competition were chosen in early May, and the winners were announced at the Outwin Boochever Portrait Competition Awards Celebration Thursday, October 22. In addition, one exhibiting artist will win the People’s Choice Award, in which visitors to the exhibition, both online and in the gallery, may cast a vote for their favorite of the forty-nine finalists. Voting for the People’s Choice Award will close January 18, 2010.

The Outwin Boochever Portrait Competition is named for Virginia Outwin Boochever, a docent for and ardent supporter of the National Portrait Gallery. The exhibition’s catalog describes Mrs. Boochever’s endowment for the portrait competition “as a way to benefit artists directly… as a unique opportunity to fill a void in the American art world.” The works in the Outwin Boochever competition will be on display until August 22, 2010." To view images of the works, see the exhibition website.

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