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The National Portrait Gallery acknowledges the Traditional Custodians of Country throughout Australia and recognises the continuing connection to lands, waters and communities. We pay our respect to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures and to Elders both past and present.

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander viewers are warned that this website contains images of deceased persons.

Festival opening night dinner with Paul West

25 August 2016
General content

Join the host of River Cottage Australia for a special meal and conversation

Angus Trumble National Portrait Gallery Director

National Portrait Gallery Director announced

20 December 2013
Archived media releases 2013

The National Portrait Gallery welcomes Angus Trumble

Ben McNamara

Ben McNamara

Vox pops

This is Marissa Gallagher from Kintore, which if you're in Alice Springs, just go west until the WA border, just before that, a traditional area of Pintupi mob.

Yellow portrait (portrait of Alex Jelinek)

The choices of a modern woman

It's Complicated

When opposites attract

Nick Cave, Susie Bick and Luke Cave, 1998 (printed 2020) Dominique Issermann. Courtesy of the artist © Dominique Issermann

Stepping out

Devotion

Beautiful punk love

Margaret Seares

Margaret Seares, 2018

by Cherry Hood
General content

Commissioned with funds provided by the Sid and Fiona Myer Family Foundation 2018

Ruby Hunter

The Legend of Ruby and Archie

Devotion

A bond in song

Hetti

A photographer’s glamorous friends

Nearest & Dearest

Community, arts, activism

The Go-Betweens, London, c.1986 Warwick Orme

Oz Indie

Under the Milky Way tonight
General content

It was the era of recording your favourite songs directly from the radio; of seeing the latest acts and clips on Countdown; and when the Aussie bands you saw on TV and heard in the charts were the ones you could see live at the pub.

Chris Wallace-Crabbe

2014-15 Acquisition Fund

Annual Appeal

Kristin Headlam's portrait of Chris Wallace-Crabbe was acquired with the support of the Circle of Friends in 2014.

Gordon Darling Hall, National Portrait Gallery

Architecture

About us

Natural light and human proportions – the design by Johnson Pilton Walker

Abduction/The Forest, 2009  © Pushpamala N.

Pushpamala N

by Ajay Sinha
Artist essays

Pushpamala N. was born in 1956 in Bangalore. Her early training was in sculpture, but as her practice progressed she brought an early enthusiasm for narrative figuration into her photographic work.

Richard Walley

Richard Walley OAM honoured in new Portrait Gallery commission

2 September 2015
Archived media releases 2015

A new commissioned portrait funded by the Gallery’s Foundation will be launched at Murdoch University in Perth tonight, Wednesday 2 September.

David Cossini

David Cossini

Vox pops

Godfrey's amazing man. I've known him for four years now. He has a very tough story.

Bathing woman, Bridlington, c.1825 by John Dempsey

Allow me to introduce...

General content

These full-length figures in watercolour, gouache and pencil date mostly from the 1820s, and almost all come from the collection of the Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery, Hobart.

Uli Sigg

About the exhibition

General content

Portraits from the Sigg collection, from 1979 to the present including painting, sculpture, photography, video and installation.

Untitled, 1995 by Fang Lijun

Go Figure! Contemporary Chinese Portraiture

12 July 2012
Previous media releases

Exhibited simultaneously at the two locations, Go Figure! is drawn from the Sigg Collection, the largest and most significant collection of contemporary Chinese art anywhere in the world.

Red child, 2005 by Zhang Xiaogang

Zhang Xiaogang

Featured Artists

Born 1958, Kunming, Yunnan Province. Lives and works in Beijing.

Tim Winton

2020 Annual Appeal

Annual Appeal

In 2020 the Annual Appeal was focussed on Sally Robinson's remarkable portrait of author Tim Winton.

Man of the year #4, 2011 by Agus Suwage

Agus Suwage

by Enin Supriyanto
Artist essays

Born in 1959, Agus Suwage was educated in the creative hub of Central Java, Yogyakarta before moving west to study graphic design at the Bandung Institute of Technology.

Davida Allen, 2016 by Mark Mohell

Davida Allen

Explore The Popular Pet Show

Going around a gallery with a child, we point to a painting of a dog and brightly ask ‘What’s that?’ If they don’t say ‘A dog’, we tell them that’s what it is. We don’t say it’s a shape inscribed by an artist that’s popularly understood to signify a dog. That’d only serve to foster a smarty-pants.

Nicholas Paspaley Jnr

Nicholas Paspaley Jnr, 2018

by Andrew Bonneau
General content

Commissioned with funds provided by Ross Adler AC 2018

Chairman Sid Myer AM, Hayley Baillie, Tim Bednall, Jillian Broadbent AC, Patrick Corrigan AM, Marilyn Darling AC, Tim Fairfax AC, Penny Fowler, John Liangis, Dr Helen Nugent AC and Nigel Satterley AM

Foundation Members

Foundation

Chairman Sid Myer AM, Hayley Baillie, Tim Bednall, Jillian Broadbent AC, Patrick Corrigan AM, Marilyn Darling AC, Tim Fairfax AC, Penny Fowler, John Liangis, Dr Helen Nugent AC and Nigel Satterley AM.

June Dally-Watkins

2023 Annual Appeal

Annual Appeal

In 2023 the Annual Appeal was focussed on a work by one of Australia's best loved and most successful portrait painters, Judy Cassab AO CBE, depicting model, entrepreneur and deportment icon, June Dally-Watkins OAM.

Kid A, 2014 by Joshua Morris

Swimming every day

NPPP 2015 exhibition essay
General content

Dr Christopher Chapman, National Photographic Portrait Prize judge and curator, introduces the 2015 Prize.

National Portrait Gallery

History

About us

How the National Portrait Gallery and its unique collection came to be

Potret diri di depan kelambu terbuka (Self portrait before the open mosquito net), 2009 by Herra Pahlasari

Herra Pahlasari

by Aminudin TH Siregar
Artist essays

At the time of Herra Pahlasari’s birth in 1978, her academic parents were living in Canberra.

Did you come here to find history?, 2009 Edition 3/3
by Nusra Latif Qureshi

Nusra Latif Qureshi

by Hammad Nasar
Artist essays

Nusra Latif Qureshi was born in Pakistan in 1973 and originally trained in the traditional art of Mughal miniature (musaviri) paintings.

Yog Raj Chitrakar: Memory Drawing V (Part II), 2010 Yog Raj Chitrakar: Memory drawing series
by Nikhil Chopra

Nikhil Chopra

by Rattanamol Johal
Artist essays

Nikhil Chopra was born in 1974, in Calcutta. His first degree was in commerce, but in 1997 he took up fine art studies, eventually gaining a Masters in Fine Art from Ohio State University, United States.

Fiona McMonagle, 2016 by Mark Mohell

Fiona McMonagle

Explore The Popular Pet Show

Fiona aims to create a dangerous situation with a flood of water on the paper, forcing each work to the point where it can fail, and then rescuing it. 

Anna Culliton, 2016 by Mark Mohell

Anna Culliton

Explore The Popular Pet Show

Anna Culliton never had a colouring-in book when she was little. Her parents –Tony, a filmmaker, and Stephanie, a painter – wouldn’t let her have one. Instead, they insisted on her drawing her own pictures to colour-in. 

The Art Lovers - Megan, 2013 by Gary Grealy

Everybody, look serious

NPPP 2014 exhibition essay
General content

Dr Sarah Engledow, National Photographic Portrait Prize judge and curator, introduces the 2014 Prize.

Trevor Jamieson, 2016 by Brett Canet-Gibson

The more things change...

NPPP 2017 exhibition essay
General content

Dr Sarah Engledow, National Photographic Portrait Prize judge and curator, introduces the 2017 Prize.

Barry Humphries

Uncommon Australians

The vision of Gordon and Marilyn Darling
General content

Sarah Engledow writes about Gordon and Marilyn Darling and their support for the National Portrait Gallery throughout its evolution.

Dr Reg Hook

Inner Worlds and psychoanalysis

Lecture, 4 June 2011
General content

Inner Worlds evokes a broad view of psychology as a discipline. However, the specific interests of the practitioners whose portraits are included in the exhibition incorporate specialist areas including psychoanalysis.

Self portrait

Rick Amor: 21 Portraits

General content

Sarah Engledow chronicles Rick Amor's work and accomplishments in this extensive essay in conjunction with the exhibition Rick Amor: 21 Portraits.

George Reid paperweight

Some prime ministers

General content

Sarah Engledow explores the history of the prime ministers and artists featured in the exhibition.

David Marr, 2011 by Nicholas Harding

Nicholas Harding: 28 Portraits

Exhibition essay
General content

Sarah Engledow looks at three decades of Nicholas Harding's portraiture.

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Canberra, ACT 2600, Australia

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The National Portrait Gallery acknowledges the Traditional Custodians of Country throughout Australia and recognises the continuing connection to lands, waters and communities. We pay our respect to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures and to Elders past and present. We respectfully advise that this site includes works by, images of, names of, voices of and references to deceased people.

This website comprises and contains copyrighted materials and works. Copyright in all materials and/or works comprising or contained within this website remains with the National Portrait Gallery and other copyright owners as specified.

The National Portrait Gallery respects the artistic and intellectual property rights of others. The use of images of works of art reproduced on this website and all other content may be restricted under the Australian Copyright Act 1968 (Cth). Requests for a reproduction of a work of art or other content can be made through a Reproduction request. For further information please contact NPG Copyright.

The National Portrait Gallery is an Australian Government Agency