Review: Episode 2 Artist of the Year 2026

PAOTY 2026 Episode 2 Artists with self portraits

The Sitters for the Second Episode of Portrait Artist of the Year 2026 were Louis Theroux, Anthony Scaramucci and Joanna Scanlon and one of them made it to the shortlist twice - while another missed out!

This is my review of Episode 2 which covers:

• the artists
• the sitters
• self-portrait submissions
• themes arising in the episode
• who the sitters chose
• the shortlist
• the winner

PAOTY Episode 1

Episode 2: The Sitters

Two of the sitters
Anthony Scarramucci and Joanna Scanlon

Unlike the first episode, the three sitters had very diverse backgrounds and occupations. All are aged above 50 so a generally more relaxed set of sitters.

• Louis Theroux (age 56) is a presenter and BBC documentary maker of some renown. His programmes - often about odd people or organisations - have won him three BAFTAs and a Royal Television Society Television Award. Somebody gave him some very bad advice about what to bring.
• Anthony Scarramucci's claim to fame is he briefly served (11 days) as Trump's  White House communications director in 2017. Age 64, he started out working at Goldman Sachs - ininvestment banking, equities, and private wealth management - before going on to found his own investment firm and subsequently write a number of books. Since April 2024, I've been listening to him as one half of "The Rest is Politics US Edition" podcast with Katty Kay - and he's very good!
• Joanna Scanlon (age 65) is a British actress and writer. She's had a number of nominations for various awards and won a BAFTA for best actress in a leading role in 2020. I remember her best as a completely pivotal person in "The Thick of It" which satirised the inner workings of government, which used to be much appreciated by those of us who'd been in there!

Episode 2: The Artists

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A post shared by Maggie McManus (@maggiemcmanusart)

Left to right: Nasha Cash, Alice Parsloe, Maggie Macmanus, Mackenzy Beard, Andrea Broug, Joshua Obichere, Sam Reeves, Joanna Houghton, Jake Fern.

The artists, in alphabetical order, are:

• Makenzy Beard (Instagram) (Linkedin)(age 19) from Swansea in South Wales, her appearance on the programme got her a spot on her local BBC News programme. She is an established Welsh portrait artist who earned international recognition from a very young age. Age 14, she started painting in the garden shed during Covid lockdown. Next she had work accepted for the RA Summer Exhibition. Recently she has worked with a gallery in Cardiff where she has held multiple sellout solo-exhibitions and raised over £45k for charity since her painting journey began. Her work has also been featured in The Times, BBC Breakfast, BBC Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour, ITV News, Sky News with Alastair Stewart, The Times Radio. She became a professional artist, in September 2025, while having a gap year after her A Levels. She also plans to do a philosophy degree.
• Andrea Broug (Instagram) (age 18) - A sixth form student, currently sitting her "A" Levels. Now based in London, she is a former student of North Halifax Grammar School. She likes to explore cultural identity, familial bonding, and historical representations of skin tones and Black history in painting
• Nasha Cash - she is a Sheffield born, multi-disciplinary artist and illustrator who’s spent the last decade living and working in Manchester. She does "Live Painting and Murals" and "Speed Portraiture for Events". She's worked with a number of clients to create works for many different projects, campaigns and events.
• Jake Fern (Instagram)- a British portrait and landscape artist living and working in Saltdean, Brighton, England. He usually works from life and on commission re. portraits. BELOW Eva Langret was asking a question (in true Socratic method - designed to stimulate creative thinking) rather than giving tips! This is a link to a very interesting interview with him by "Artists and Illustrators"

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• Joanna Houghton (Instagram)- an artist based in Manchester. Originally from North Wales, Joanna graduated from Manchester School of Art with a degree in Illustration in 2012. Her submission was a very small drawing of her one year old in coloured pencils.
• Maggie McManus (Instagram) - Originally from Leeds, now living in Manchester, teaching secondary Art full time and painting. She describes herself as an art teacher, artist and mother.
• Joshua Obichere (Instagram) - from East London. MA Fine Art, Fine/Studio Arts, General from Central St. Martins. Master of Education - MEd from Cambridge University. Full time Artist and Art Educator passionate about creativity, art for race and social justice. He runs workshops as one half of an art duo. He talked very confidently about his process of using grout and oil paints to create portraits. Jonathan Yeo commented he was one of the most original artists in terms of the materials he was using. He paints by icing the outline in grout.
• Alice Parsloe (Instagram) - an artist and former actor based in North London. She now freelances as a voiceover artist. She works with oil pastels on cardboard.
• Sam Reeves (Instagram, Facebook) - a Fine Art student studying at Liverpool Hope University, who specialises in realistic portraiture of people and pets. He works primarily in oil paint. He's due to graduate in June 2027. He's participated in a number of exhibitions. This was his self portrait The Gridded Self

Self Portrait Submissions

Judges viewing the self portrait submissions.

Review: "Future Ruins" by Michael Landy at the Sir John Soane Museum

It was my very great pleasure yesterday to meet former "Young British Artist" Michael Landy RA. He is an amazing draughtsman who is justly renowned for his meticulous drawings

As I'm a huge fan of drawing, I've always very much enjoyed his series of etchings of weeds titled "Nourishment" - which I've been to see in the Archive of Tate Britain.

This series was created immediately after and maybe in response to possibly his most famous work. His major 2001 installation work Breakdown — saw all 7,227 of his personal possessions being destroyed in the windows of the defunct C&A store on London's Oxford Street - after which he was left with nothing.

In the series Nourishment (2002) the overlooked city weeds were collected from city pavements.

They served as personal metaphors for resilience, survival, and finding life in hostile urban environments. (see also Nourishment (2024) at the Thomas Dane Gallery which includes weeds collected from the streets of Naples).

That's by way of a very long preamble and introduction to his current work....

Future Ruins

His series "Future Ruins" imagines what some iconic buildings might look like in future after an event which left them in ruins. 

For anybody who likes drawing and/or architecture or both, I'd highly recommend you pay a visit ot the Sir John Soane Museum in Lincoln's In Fields.

The exhibition features new and recent work which is shown in the context of the art that first inspired Landy to create the series.

A work from the museum’s collection - Joseph Michael Gandy’s watercolour Architectural Ruins - A Vision (1798) - commissioned by Sir John Soane and depicting the then-Bank of England as a Roman ruin was an inspiration for Landy. Now this work will be displayed alongside the artist’s own imagining of a future filled with overgrown nature and crumbling structures.

The vast majority of the drawings of imaginary future ruins. Some are drawings done of existing ruined buildings.

The scope of buildings includes everything from the Bank of England, to the art shop where he used to buy his art materials and his old home in Ilford to Mar A Largo and Kanye West's house in Malibu at 24844 Malibu Road - which oddly was one of the houses which burned during the bad Californian fires last year.

Imaginary view of The Bank of England in ruins (2023)

after Joseph Michael Gandy
signed titled verso indelible pen
permanent pen on paper
76 x 56.1 cm. 30 x 22 in.

Review: Episode 1 Portrait Artist of the Year 2026

This week we had the screening of the first episode of the brand new series (13th) of Portrait Artist of the Year - with a brand new set of Judges!

As I have been doing every year since 2018, I'm writing a review of every episode of this thirteenth series.

Series 13 of Sky Arts Portrait Artist of the Year

This review post considers:

• The Competition
• Then Commission
• The (New) Judges
• The sitters
• The artists
• Self-portrait submissions
• Themes observed during the episode - and observations on different approaches
• Portraits and the Judging
• Shortlist
• The winner
• Next episode
• Reference (previous posts re. 2026 - and how to access posts re previous series)

About the Context

The Competition

Sky Arts runs a competition every year called Portrait Artist of the Year. This is the 13th Series - and I have been reviewing every episode of every series on Making A Mark since 2018. (Check out my Call for Entries: Portrait Artist of the Year 2026).

It comprises

• a series of heats, - with nine artists painting 3 sitters - followed by
• a semi final - of all the heat winners
• a Final of the best three in the Semi Final
• a Commission by the winner of the Final

The Heats, Semi Final and Final are typically all held in the Grand Hall at Battersea Arts Centre. People can get tickets to watch and many do. I watched Heat 2 this year in April this year - and have lots of pics!

Battersea Arts Centre

I wrote about how the series works in detail in my Call for Entries post so won't repeat it here.

There are 72 artists in Series 13 - meaning we have 8 heats. The order of the episodes is generally NOT the same as the order of the episodes. Unless I turn up in the next episode in which case they may have changed the rule.

 

The Series Commission - for the National Portrait Gallery

This year, the £10,000 commission is from the National Portrait Gallery to paint a portrait of musician and actor Damien Lewis. 

There's an interesting MEDIA TWIST with the commission being for the NPG. 

I would draw a very big distinction between images in the collection for historical reasons and images on the walls of the NPG

• The portraits the NPG typically hangs in the galleries are those painted in OIL - on the grounds of longevity. 
• This instantly rules out all those using other media eg watercolour or pastels.

The Primary Collection contains more than 11,000 portraits. Of these about 4,000 are paintings, sculptures and miniatures, approaching 60% of which are regularly displayed, with the intention to show a further selection. In addition, there are almost 7,000 light-sensitive works on paper, shown on a rotating basis of about 300 items a year to avoid excessive light exposure and thus to minimise deterioration and fading. Introduction to the Primary Collection

(There are 

• 1,446 watercolours in the collection - but almost all are miniatures or very small portraits of a very historical nature (ie Reference Collection) with a very few more recent drawings of famous people which might be included in a temporary exhibit
• 5 paintings in egg tempera
• 34 paintings in acrylic - because of the issues with cracking which emerged over time? The only important (royal) paintings painted in acrylic hung in the galleries were painted in the 1980s. 
• 118 portrait drawings in charcoal
• 22 portrait drawings in graphite - again mainly miniatures)
• no pastels at all.)

This is a logistics and communication issue for the programme organisers. If you know the commissioning organisation is a national gallery, then you really need to be frank about what this means for the prospective participants in the competition.

e.g. Any media is fine for participation in the heats but progression is likely to favour oils.

The Judges

After very many years of moaning about the previous Judges, we have three new Judges. 

I wrote about their backgrounds back in February in The NEW Portrait Artist of the Year Judges. They are

• Eva Langret - Director of Frieze London
• Jonathan Yeo - portrait painter
• Katy Hessel - art historian, author and braodcaster

Three new Judges for Series 13 in 2026

(Lto R): Eva Langret, Katy Hessel and Jonathan Yeo

One of things I'll be looking at as I trawl around the internet is viewers' views on the new Judges - and will maybe write another post on your views.

PAOTY Episode 1

Episode 1: The Sitters

The three sitters were all actors. In the order they were introduced they are:

• Lenny James - A 61 year old English actor of Afro-Trinidadian parents, best known for portraying 
• Morgan Jones in the AMC series The Walking Dead (2010–2018)
• DCI Tony Gates in Line of Duty series one
• and more recently in Mr Loverman
• He's a big fan of Spurs and brought a shirt
• Sheridan Smith OBE - A 45 year old English actress and singer who is probably best known for characters in a series of sitcoms. She has been awarded two Olivier Awards, a British Academy Television Award, and a National Television Award, and brought her BAFTA (for Mrs Biggs) as one of her items.
• Vanessa Williams is a 63 year old American singer, actress, model, producer and dancer. She was the first Black woman to win the Miss America title when she was crowned Miss America 1984. Back in April she was starring in The Devil Wears Prada at the Dominion Theatre in the West End stage where she was playing the Miranda Priestley role.

Sheridan Smith and Vanessa Williams back to back
in their segments

Episode 1: The Artists

I do a lot of research about the artists, as you get the highly edited version and I like the full public version! I find it also invariably makes more sense of some of the Judge's decisions.

Review: 63rd Society of Wildlife Artists Annual Exhibition

The 63rd Annual Exhibition of the Society of Wildlife Artists is currently at the Mall Galleries

It's also the last exhibition of Harriet Mead as President of the SWLA, a role she has fulfilled extremely well for the last 17 years. She steps down at the AGM in November 2026.

Harriet Mead with six of her sculptures of wildlife
created from welded found metal
Five of which have already sold!

The exhibition also saw the launch of the SWLA's new book about its Massingham Heath Project which started in May 2025. The book is available to buy at the exhibition

The Massingham Heath Project will see over thirty of our member artists follow the seasons and changing flora, fauna and landscape of an exciting rewilding project in West Norfolk.

This is a review of this exhibition which continues until Saturday 10th October.

About the Exhibition

There are either 359 exhibits in the show which creates a good show on the walls without the exhibition seeming too overcrowded. 

There are a lot of birds in the East Gallery

Artwork includes oils, watercolours, acrylics, pastels, drawings, sculpture, original prints, mixed media and animation. 

Much of the sculpture is beyond competent and some is extremely spectacular such as the cranes in the East gallery (see above)

One aspect I particularly like about this show is there are so many excellent fine art prints (84 in total) which can be much more affordable - and sometimes smaller and easier to find a home for on your walls. These include Serigraphs, Etchings,Etching and monoprints, Etching and Aquatints, Linocuts and Reduction Linocuts, Lithographs, Collographs, Drypoints, Drypoint and chine colle, Monotypes, Mokuhanga (Japanese woodblock), Mokulito (wood lithograph) and Screenprints

Some of the prints plus a snake

More prints

What distinguishes the artwork in this wildlife art show is that it is based on actual observation of the subject, rather than the conversion of a photograph into a drawing, print or painting. The selectors are always looking for the signs that an artwork is based on personal and real observation.

Harriet Mead drew my attention to a submission by a new artist on the end wall of the West Gallery. This is not normally an exhibition where you see big cats or tropical animals. Yet this was a painting of Tiger Cubs. As Harriet said to me, you could tell straight away that this was based on observation in real life. It turned out the painting was was by an Italian artist who had visited Vietnam and come across captive cubs.

Tiger Cubs by Francesco Calistri (Italy)
oil and acrylic on canvas

All the artworks are for sale and many of the artists can (and are) commissioned.

The trend I observed last year towards more smaller - and more affordable - medium and small size artwork seems to have continued - which I think is very sensible in the current economic context. 

Nearly 80% of the 72 artworks sold in the first five days are priced at less than £1,500 with most sales being for less than £1,000. This in part reflects changes in sizes of artwork.

You can see the artworks:

"Turning Thirteen" by Frances Bell wins HSFK Portrait Award Visitor's Choice

I have to say I am not in the least bit surprised that "Turning Thirteen" by Frances Bell has won the Visitor's Choice award - as announced by the National Portrait Gallery this afternoon on Facebook and Instagram.

Visitor's Choice Award - Frances Bell

Frances Bell and her daughter 
with her portrait of "Turning Thirteen"
at the HSFK Portrait Award Exhibition at the National Gallery, London
© Making A Mark

Here's what I had to say about Frances Bell and her portrait back in my post Portrait Award 2026 - Artists with their paintings (Children and Parents)

Here's MY reasons for why Frances's portrait won.