Portraiture
What is portraiture?
It could be:
- Your Identity, a self portrait (realistic or abstracted)
- Traditional portraiture - learning techniques
- Psychology
- An Issue eg. depression, social anxiety, equality, body image etc.
- Media or artwork style - leading to experiments with media
- Capturing a moment or an emotion
Portraiture Artist List
This is a list of portraiture artists. You can use this to help you with your folio. Make sure to reference artworks with the title, medium, date and size.
The Archibald art prize has many artists who work in this theme.
http://www.artgallery.nsw.gov.au/prizes/archibald/
Australian Artists:
Non Australian Portraiture Artists
Sculpture and Installation
The Archibald art prize has many artists who work in this theme.
http://www.artgallery.nsw.gov.au/prizes/archibald/
Australian Artists:
- Anna Platten
- Arthur Boyd
- Ben Quilty
- Danie Mellor - Blue and white drawings of Australiana
- Dianne Jones - appropriation of Shearing the Rams
- Emma Hack - photography and body painting
- Kathryn Del Barton
- Kim Buck
- John Brack
- Lin Onus - his identity as an Aboriginal and Non-Aboriginal person
- Sydney Long - art nouveu influence
- Tom Roberts
- Tim Storrier - Surreal. Fire.
- Tracey Moffatt - photographer. narrative
- Vernon Ah Kee - political, anti-racism, social issues
Non Australian Portraiture Artists
- Alexa Meade
- Anatole - portraits made from text/words
- Andy Warhol
- Chuck Close
- Edgar Degas - dancers and sculpture as well
- Edvard Munch - anxiety
- Freda Kahlo - Identity, she used her personal tragedies - both physical and psychological
- Gabriel Moreno - illustration/design. Beauty.
- Georg Baselitz
- Gustav Klimt
- Hannah Hoch - Dada. Collage.
- Heather Hansen - making art with her body / mandalas
- Ian McArthur - illustration
- Kara Walker - African American identity - silhouettes
- Keith Haring - Pioneer of graffiti/street art
- Marlene Dumas - abstract figurative works inspired by personal memories
- Matt Wisniewski - photopgraphy
- Max Dupain - photography
- Pablo Picasso - abstract
- Phillip Toledano - digital photos/ consumerism
- Rene Magritte - surrealism
- Roy Lichtenstein
- Sandra Chevier - portraits with hidden faces
- Shepard Fairey - street artist. Propaganda/political.
- Sofia Bonati
- Steve McCurry - photography
- Tigran Tsitoghdzyan -the masks we wear
- Toni Orrico
- Vincent Bakkum - idealised women, art nouveau influence
- Vincent Giarrano - oil paintings
- Vincent Van Gogh - self portraits
- Wangechi Mutu - collage
- William Kentridge - sketches and animation
- Yue Minjun
- Zak Smith
- Zhang Xiaogang - works from family photos
Sculpture and Installation
- Antony Gormley - metal
- Ah Xian - ceramic busts with patterns
- Barbara Licha - emotion. Wire sculptures
- Cheryl Pope - focus on issues of power, inequality, race, gender and identity. Sculpture, installation and performance.
- Eva Hesse
- Henry Moore - abstract human forms
- Louise Bourgeois - influenced by traumatic psychological events from her childhood
- Marc Quinn - frozen head made from blood
- Motoi Yamamoto - salt labyrinths in memory of his sister
- Nele Azevedo - ice installation
- Patricia Piccini - genetics and science
- Rob Mulholland
- Ronit Baranga - ceramics
Example: Heather Hansen
Kate Powell has shared her Art projects on social media platforms since she was fifteen years old. She has over 12,000 fans on Facebook and 34,000 followers on tumblr.
Click the button below to read about Kate Powell's success in the art world as a high school student.
Antony Gormley, Allotment 11, 1996, installation of clay sculptures on gallery floor.
Nick Mourtzakis, David Chalmers, oil on canvas, 2011
Emily Kame Kngwarreye, Merne (Everything), 1996, acrylic paint
Kngwarreye is an Aboriginal artist of Australia. She creates paintings based on the land and her Dreamtime stories. Because Aboriginal connections to the land run so deep, it can be said that these artworks are like portraits. Portraits that show the interconnection of identity to the land around them.
Portraits can be abstract, they don't need to be a realistic depiction of someone.
Portraits can be abstract, they don't need to be a realistic depiction of someone.
Max Dupain, Bondi, 1939, silver gelatin photograph, 38 x 40 cm
The iconic 'Bondi' image captures the view of the sunbaker. Dupain shot 'Bondi' from ground level providing a tilted view of the common beach scene.
This voyeuristic image captures a woman from behind at the moment she self-consciously adjusts her swimsuit. The feminine gesture of her hands and the soft lines of her body are contrasted by the masculine pose of her partner, standing with sharp, angular arms on his hips.
The iconic 'Bondi' image captures the view of the sunbaker. Dupain shot 'Bondi' from ground level providing a tilted view of the common beach scene.
This voyeuristic image captures a woman from behind at the moment she self-consciously adjusts her swimsuit. The feminine gesture of her hands and the soft lines of her body are contrasted by the masculine pose of her partner, standing with sharp, angular arms on his hips.
Fiona Hall, Medicine Bundles for the non-born child, aluminium, rubber teats
child’s jacket, 1993
child’s jacket, 1993
Consider what this artist is trying to say. Hall has cut coke cans to knit baby clothing.
Thinking conceptually, what is the contrast here? Would you want to put this jacket on a baby?
Why would Hall create such a contrast?
What is Coke a symbol of generally?
What is the artist trying to say?
This is a loose interpretation of portraiture. However, the artwork is steeped in humanitarian issues as well as how we treat our planet.
Thinking conceptually, what is the contrast here? Would you want to put this jacket on a baby?
Why would Hall create such a contrast?
What is Coke a symbol of generally?
What is the artist trying to say?
This is a loose interpretation of portraiture. However, the artwork is steeped in humanitarian issues as well as how we treat our planet.