BP Portrait Award Exhibition 2019 (Part 2): Analysis

With the second part of my review of the BP Portrait Award 2019 exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery I'm digging deeper and looking in particular at various attributes of the selected portraits - and other reviews of the exhibition.

You can also read my earlier post BP Portrait Award Exhibition 2019 (Part 1): Overview critique

BP Portrait Award 2019 - one of the walls with more colourful paintings

At the end of my analysis, I concluded that it is so very sad that an exhibition which used to be a joy to visit has become such a shadow of its former self. The exhibition has, for the most part, lost numbers, size, colour and complexity from the portraits on display.

A collection of small and tiny paintings around one medium sized painting

Reviews of the exhibition

Reviews by the newspapers were almost entirely limited to the issues concerning the BP Sponsorship within the context of concern about climate change and the use of fossil fuels.

Apart from the latter part of the The Times review, these are NOT serious reviews of an art exhibition.

• Review: BP Portrait Award at the National Portrait Gallery | The Times - by Rachel Campbell-Johnston (The Times newspaper's chief art critic) - who gave it a 2 star rating and was not at all enthused about the subjects or their portraits!

It’s not the pictures that people are talking about. It’s the sponsor. For three decades, the name of the world’s biggest fossil fuel producer has branded the BP Portrait Award. As a result, protest has become as much a feature of the annual awards ceremony as the announcement of a winner.
Thus far, however, this protest always stopped at the portico of the National Portrait Gallery. Now it marches right in. Gary Hume, who sits on the judging panel, as well as eight other artists previously involved in the event, have voiced their concern about what they see as an uncomfortable liaison.

• 2019 BP Portrait Award announced amid sponsorship controversy | The Telegraph by Biba Kang (who mainly covers film and music) - no comment on the art in the exhibition other than standard PR release stuff re the winner
• Charlie Schaffer wins 2019 BP portrait award | The Guardian by Lanre Bakare (Guardian arts and culture correspondent - who mainly covers music) - could have been written at her desk without visiting the exhibition. It uses press release information and press material from the BP Protestors

Award comes amid criticism of BP’s funding and sponsorship of National Portrait Gallery The Guardian

• The Evening Standard which has always produced good coverage for this award stopped posting after the shortlist was announced. I must say I continue to miss Brian Sewell.... 

I read them and concluded that I was not the only one convinced that the BP Portrait Award is losing its status as well as competent Judges, its normal gallery and portrait paintings in the exhibition.

What's Different? An analysis of the Portraits

Every year I do an analysis of the portraits selected for the exhibition in terms of size and type - and you can see the results below. This year's exhibition prompted me to think about a wider-ranging analysis and to think about doing more analysis of the exhibits over time....

The factors I consider below are:

• number
• size and media
• type
• composition
• colour
• subject

Award winners at the RHS Botanical Art Show 2019

Botanical artists from all over the world who compete for medals at the Royal Horticultural Society's Botanical Art equivalent of the Chelsea Flower Show have to work very hard for their medals and have five years from being approved to exhibit to get it right for a 2.5 day exhibition.

Judges are not satisfied with one painting. They want six - on a theme, botanically accurate and correct, constructed using artistic skills and with a visually aesthetic appeal.

View of some of the exhibits of six (typically watercolour) paintings of plants on a theme at the RHS Botanical Art Show

BELOW are images of the Major Awards

You can also

• see my photos of the Gold Medal Winners and news of who won which medal in
  RHS London Botanical Art Show 2019 - Awards and Medal Winners
• 10 Gold Medals
• 8 Silver Gilt Medals
• 10 Silver Medals
• 2 Bronze Medals
• read How RHS medals for Botanical Art are assessed
• read more about the individual artists in Exhibiting artists at the RHS Botanical Art Show 2019

The Gold Medals were split between:

• 5 UK Artists (4 English and 1 Scottish)
• 4 Japanese artists 
• a group of Russian Artists

The exhibition at the RHS London Botanical Art and Photography Show is open today and closes at 5pm. It's in the RHS Lindley Hall in Elverton Street in Westminster.

Best Botanical Painting 2019

Mariko Ikeda (GM 2017 and Best Exhibit 2017) - Pandanus tectorius of Micronesian Atoll (Watercolour on vellum)

Mariko lives in Tokyo. She has a Ph.D. in the Sciences of Art (2009) and has been a Botanical Art Instructor in Tokyo since 2006. In terms of previous awards she has

• won 1st Prize (twice) at the Botanical Art Competition run by the National Museum of Nature and Science in Tokyo.
• won a Gold Medal for her exhibit of Pandanus at the RHS Botanical Art Show in 2017 and was also awarded Best Exhibit in show.
• this year won another Gold Medal and Best Painting.

Best Botanical Painting: Mariko Ikeda : P.Tectorius ‘En Khelen’

Mariko Ikeda GM (2017 + Best Exhibit, 2019 + Best Painting) Pandanus tectorius of Micronesia

Best Exhibit 2019

Naomi Gumma (Japan) - A Gift from the Gods: The Life Cycle of the Shimonita Welsh Onion (Tempera on paper)

This is Naomi's first visit to RHS and she has won a Gold Medal and Best Exhibit!  She also dressed in sync with her plant!

Best Botanical Art Exhibit 2019: Naomi Gumma GM (2019): The Lifecycle of the Shimonita Welsh Onion

Judges Special Award 2019

Betsy Rogers-Knox: Exploring the Seasons at Beckley Bog

This was awarded because of the significant educational value of Betsy' watercolour paintings about bog plants growing in a specific environment.

Exploring the Seasons at Beckley Bog - The Botany and Beauty of Vascular Plants and Bog Benefits
Betsy Rogers-Knox

Judges’ Special Award 2019: Betsy Rogers-Knox

[NOTE: Most of my writing about botanical art is now on my Botanical Art and Artists website - and I'm currently writing up this year's awards - and TIPS -  from the RHS London Art and Photography Competition 2019 on my news blog - which you can subscribe to if interested]

I'm at the RHS Botanical Art Show all week

Apologies to those who are expecting the next instalment of my review of the BP Portrait Award but I haven't quite finished it and I'm now at or occupied with the RHS Botanical Art Show (RHS London Botanical Art and Photography Show) for the rest of the week - followed by lying down in a dark room for a while because I'll be out for the count!

The next instalment PART TWO - ANALYSIS & what's changed should be up on Sunday.

In the meantime if you like Botanical Art get down to the RHS Lindley Hall in Elverton Street, Westminster where you can see a fabulous international art exhibition - of botanical art - with artists who have flown in from all over the world - and RHS medals awarded for their efforts.

Here's a couple of my blog posts about it - and you can see pics from the Reception last night on my Botanical Art and Artists Facebook Page

• Exhibiting artists at the RHS Botanical Art Show 2019
• How RHS medals for Botanical Art are assessed

So nice to go to an exhibition where there are clearly defined standards for the subject matter and all the judging panel include people who are botanical artists who've already won RHS Gold Medals and other experts!

Now there's an idea - create a Judging Panel for the BP Portrait Award of previous First Prize Winners!

BP Portrait Award Exhibition 2019 (Part 1): Overview critique

Entrance to the BP Portrait Award 2019

This year it's the 40th year of the Portrait Award which started in 1980.Time to take stock - so I'm dividing my review of the the BP Portrait Award 2019 exhibition into two parts as follows.

PART ONE - OVERVIEW & Critique

This includes

• my overall impression of the exhibition
• a commentary on the relative status of this exhibition after 40 years- as it downsizes in more ways than one
• the overall quality of portraits hung
• the major problem with the hang
• the competence of the Judging Panel this year
• the lack of a leader of contemporary portraiture who drives the rigor in relation to both development of the competition and selection of portraits
• why I think it runs the risk of becoming the IBM of portraiture competitions.

PART TWO - ANALYSIS & what's changed

This covers my analysis of what has changed in this year's exhibition - LESS and SMALLER are recurrent themes

• a detailed analysis of what has changed in terms of number of portraits, size and type, composition and colour and who are the subjects - with some number crunching for comparison with last year
• what I liked in terms of portraits

The hang makes it difficult to see all the portraits this year - except from a distance

This review is much later than usual. I wrote my first two posts back in June - see

• Charlie Shaffer wins BP Portrait Award 2019
• BP Portrait Award 2019: Artists with their paintings

One of the reasons for the hold up was I was trying to post my video interview with Charlie Schaffer and spent a very frustrating day trying to work out why my video software wouldn't work properly. (Still not worked that 64 bit upgrade issue out!). Then when I reviewed my photos I realised that I needed some better ones for the review of the exhibition. Great ones of individual paintings and artists with their paintings - but not ones which gave a good sense of the exhibition.  So had to go back and take some more.

I have a problem with writing reviews when I have something negative I really want to say....

Which might just have been the biggest reason for the delay.  I've said bits of what I want to say to various people and I now need to write it down too.

[Let me know what you think on the related post on my Facebook Page where comments are currently accumulating quickly!]

The most prestigious portrait painting competition in the world? Really?

About Charlotte Johnson Wahl - artist and mother of Boris.

Who knew that the man who is very likely to be the next Prime Minister is the son of an artist? I didn't until today.

His mother Charlotte Johnson Wahl has been an artist since her children were small - as evidenced by some of the paintings on her website

Indeed she has painted a rather splendid portrait of her eldest son Boris painting! (Re. the title he's known as Alexander of Al to family and childhood friends) .

In the portrait he has the very recognisable, wayward and very blonde hair together with what seems to be a tendency to look upwards at you from a slightly bowed head. (The last person who wowed the British Public while doing that was Princess Diana!)

Paintings of Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson painting and her four children with Daisies
by Charlotte Johnson Wahl

In 2015 a friend arranged an exhibition of her work at the Mall Galleries - and I can't think for the life of me why I didn't go!  Apparently she was so good at selling her work that it had to be rounded up for this retrospective exhibition.

The exhibition was called Minding Too Much: A Charlotte Johnson Wahl Retrospective.

Powerful, personal and deeply moving, the exhibition presents a collection of stunning paintings that tell the story of Johnson Wahl's turbulent life. They chart marriage, motherhood and mental breakdown - followed by early onset Parkinson's disease.

You can see on her website some of the very powerful paintings she has produced about her life: 

• as a mother of four children
• as an individual overwhelmed by her phobias who suffered a severe and prolonged mental breakdown involving admission to the Maudsley Hospital - where she became a profilic painter. I think her Maudsley paintings are very strong - some of the best I've ever seen by somebody who is an inpatient. It reminds me of how Van Gogh settled and also became an extremely prolific painter who also painted prodigiously - producing some of his best work - while at the Saint-Paul asylum in St Remy de Provence. I'm not in the least bit surprised that she had a sell-out exhibition at the end of her stay!

Paintings from her time at the Maudsley
by Charlotte Johnson Wahl

• of being involved in travelling and meeting people in different places and different groups within society.

Have a look at her website and make your own mind up.

I found some articles about her as both mother of future PM and her career as an artist which make for very interesting reading.

• Artist Charlotte Johnson Wahl: far more than just 'Boris's mum' The Telegraph - this one in was written by the friend who rounded up the paintings for the restrospective and was published at the time of the exhibition. It's well worth a read - both in terms of seeing more of her work,  understanding what drives her approach to what she paints and how it all fits in with her life as the mother of a prodigious set of children!

A Johnson Wahl canvas is instantly recognisable – bold colours, strong compositions and a deep, instinctive insight into what it means to be human. She is a complete original. Johnson Wahl received little or no formal training but, aged five, was given oil paints by her highly academic parents. 'My older sister was terribly clever, as was my younger brother,’ she says. 'My parents didn’t know what to do with me, so they gave me some paints and I turned out to be good at it. Once I started I couldn’t stop.’

• Boris Johnson’s mother on her ‘soft-hearted’ son, our odds-on future Prime Minister | The Tatler - an article which was originally printed in the March 2015 issue of Tatler but was revived in May when it became clear there was going to be an election for a new PM.

'I had become extremely phobic. I was terrified of all forms of dirt. In 1974, I had to go into the Maudsley as a patient of Professor [Hans] Eysenck [the influential late psychologist]. While I was there, I did 78 paintings and they gave me an exhibition.' (It was a sell-out).

There's also a Sky Arts Documentary called "Painting the Johnsons" - which I've not yet tracked down - but it looks fascinating and if it's not on Sky right now I'm sure it will be very soon!