- About us
- Support the Gallery
- Venue hire
- Publications
- Research library
- Organisation chart
- Employment
- Contact us
- Make a booking
- Onsite programs
- Online programs
- School visit information
- Learning resources
- Little Darlings
- Professional learning

Office romance

Finalist, MDPA 2014

Winner, MDPA 2013


National Portrait Gallery staff introduce their favourite portraits from the exhibition.

It’s curious that one of the writers most associated with the toughness of Australian bush life was himself not an exponent of the matted, rugged bushman sort of beard.

It wasn’t uncommon for the pro-beard fraternity of the mid nineteenth century to cite beards as a sign of wisdom on the grounds that Socrates and other ancient philosophers had worn them.

Although the tough, weathered, hard-drinking bushmen of the kind mythologised by writers like Banjo Paterson and Henry Lawson are popularly associated with the character of late nineteenth century Australia, it was also a time when alternative ideas about identity began to come into play.

Absence rends the heart asunder

Desirable outcomes, undesirable origins

The late Georgian and early Victorian working classes often bought their food in ale-houses, chop-houses and ‘penny pie shops’, or purchased their meals day after day in the streets.

Dissections, showcases the hyper-realist sculptural self-portrait of artist Sam Jinks, Divide, alongside the painted portrait of philosopher David Chalmers by Nick Mourtzakis, which was commissioned by the Gallery in 2011.


Press releases for media.

Leo Schofield introduces the exhibition, Masters of fare: chefs, winemakers, providores.
