Taylor Wessing National Portrait Prize

The national portrait prize is one of the most prestigious prizes in photography, It showcases 60 photographs ranging from well established one's like Platon and Chris Floyd to student and relatively unknown photographers. There were portraits of every variety of people from celebrities to hookers old to young, some had been for commercial purposes others were very personal of family members. It features portraits of people from all over the world, maybe this was a little bit to politically correct to have done so. The first thing I noticed was how many photographer were alumni from the Art's Institute of Bournemouth which is encouraging being a student here. 

Before I had gone to the exhibition one photograph I had seen in the papers was that of Rupert Murdoch by Tom Stoddart that shows him sad and exhausted and it was such a strong portrait that really gets under the skin of the subject and shows you the emotion they are going through at the time of the shutter.  Once I had arrived at the exhibition I noticed that most of the shots had that feeling of really knowing the subject. The photograph that won was Quints by Lottie Davis which showed a woman with her four recently born babies in the style of a Renaissance painting the picture which was beautifully shot and lit it seemed that this year the prizes were going to those photographs that were similar to those of paintings as second place which went to Hendrik Kerstens's showing a girl wearing a carrier bag in the style of a dutch 17th century hat.  

With the Annie Liebovitz exhibition closed I ventured down to Bethnell Green to Yinka Shonibares Gallery to go see the opening of Snap an exhibition with featured several photographers including Tara Derby, Linda Brownlee as well as others. The exhibition which in a Turner Prize winning artists gallery was far from he glorious National Portrait Gallery but in an old factory, also the photographs didn't seem so politically correct, and didn't feature celebrities it felt a lot more rough and I preferred it this way being less polished. I enjoyed going to the exhibition as I got the chance to meet some of the photographers and talk and gained some advice on how to get work and about exhibitioning. It was also interesting to see these photographers current work. It seems that exhibitions whether it be througha competition or as part of a solo/group show seems a really good way to market your photography and get yourself seen by art buyers/photo editors.