Ruth Borchard Self-Portrait Prize: Piano Nobile Kings Place
The biennial Ruth Borchard Self-Portrait Prize returned to Kings Place for its third exhibition. Featuring 100 works by British and Irish artists, the exhibition showcased the best of contemporary self-portraiture. From students to Royal Academicians, in works that ranged from lithographs to 3-D paintings, drawings to oils, photo-etchings to watercolours, the 2015 exhibition presented a diverse and exciting look at how artists see themselves.
The winner of the £10,000 Ruth Borchard Self-Portrait Prize 2015 was Shanti Panchal and his painting Artist and the Lost Studio. A tribute to the studio that Shanti built, and worked in for decades before losing earlier this year, the painting is beautiful realised in watercolour, subtly moving and haunting. The work was selected by a panel of judges including Jackie Wullschlager (Chief Art Critic, Financial Times), Charles Saumarez Smith CBE (Secretary and Chief Executive, Royal Academy of Arts), Laura Cumming (Art Critic, the Observer and author of A Face to the World), Simon Martin (Artistic Director, Pallant House Gallery, Chichester), Thomas Newbolt (Winner, Ruth Borchard Prize 2013), Dr Ruth Hallgarten (granddaughter of Ruth Borchard), and Dr Robert Travers (Director, Piano Nobile). Previous winners include Celia Paul (2011) and Thomas Newbolt (2013).
A selection of works from the exhibition toured to Pallant House Gallery, Chichester, the official museum partner of the 2015 Prize, from 31st October 2015.
