Search / emily wills

Emily Spencer Wills, c. 1855

Gift of T S Wills Cooke 2014. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.

Horace Spencer Wills and Cedric Spencer Wills, c. 1859

Gift of T S Wills Cooke 2014. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.

Puddled state, 2008

Egbert Spencer Wills, c. 1870

Gift of T S Wills Cooke 2014. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.

Horatio Spencer Wills, c. 1870

Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of T S Wills Cooke 2014
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program

Colin Wills, c. 1940s

Gift of Danina Dupain Anderson 2021. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.

Thomas Wentworth Wills

Horatio Spencer Wills, c. 1855

Gift of T S Wills Cooke 2014. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.

William John Wills, c. 1861

Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2009

Tom Wills, c. 1857 (printed c. 1905-1910)

Gift of T S Wills Cooke 2014. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.

Thomas Wentworth Wills, c. 1859

Gift of T S Wills Cooke 2014. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.

Me and My Place

The importance of being bearded

Joanna Gilmour discovers that the beards of the ill-fated explorers Burke and Wills were as epic as their expedition to traverse Australia from south to north.

The Burke and Wills Monument, 1869

Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2001

Emily Fairfax, 1870

Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of John Fairfax Holdings Ltd 2002
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program

Storied portrait

Emily Casey takes in Shirley Purdie’s remarkable self-portrait, Ngalim-Ngalimbooroo Ngagenybe.

Untitled (Study for 'Emily Kame Kngwarreye with Lily'), 1993

Gift of the artist 2002. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.

Untitled (Study for 'Emily Kame Kngwarreye with Lily'), 1993

Gift of the artist 2002. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.

Untitled (Study for 'Emily Kame Kngwarreye with Lily'), 1993

Gift of the artist 2002. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.

Untitled (Study for 'Emily Kame Kngwarreye with Lily'), 1993

Gift of the artist 2002. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.

Untitled (Study for 'Emily Kame Kngwarreye with Lily'), 1993

Gift of the artist 2002. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.

Untitled (Study for 'Emily Kame Kngwarreye with Lily'), 1993

Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of the artist 2002
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program

Untitled (Study for 'Emily Kame Kngwarreye with Lily'), 1993

Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of the artist 2002
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program

Untitled (Study for 'Emily Kame Kngwarreye with Lily'), 1993

Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of the artist 2002
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program

Untitled (Study for 'Emily Kame Kngwarreye with Lily'), 1993

Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of the artist 2002
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program

Untitled (Study for 'Emily Kame Kngwarreye with Lily'), 1993

Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of the artist 2002
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program

Untitled (Study for 'Emily Kame Kngwarreye with Lily'), 1993

Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of the artist 2002
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program

Untitled (Study for 'Emily Kame Kngwarreye with Lily'), 1993

Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of the artist 2002
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program

Untitled (Study for 'Emily Kame Kngwarreye with Lily'), 1993

Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of the artist 2002
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program

Untitled (Study for 'Emily Kame Kngwarreye with Lily'), 1993

Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of the artist 2002
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program

Untitled (Study for 'Emily Kame Kngwarreye with Lily'), 1993

Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of the artist 2002
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program

Emily, 1994

Gift of Patrick Corrigan AM 2004. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.

Emily's brush, 1994

Gift of Patrick Corrigan AM 2004. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.

Emily Kame Kngwarreye with Lily, 1993

Purchased 1998

Emily Kame Kngwarreye, 1995

Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Dr. Morris Low 2000

Emily Kngwarreye, 1994

Gift of Patrick Corrigan AM 2004. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.

Emily Kame Kngwarreye, 1995

Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Bequest of Alan Boxer 2014

William John Wills, 2nd in command of the Victorian Expedition, 1860-1861

Purchased with funds provided by Ross A Field 2007

Jenny Sages

The exhibition Sages examines the process of portrait making through four large-scale portraits of women by Jenny Sages, paired with intimate preparatory drawings.

Of Burke, Wills ... and wills

Infatuation and (ill-fated) exploration

Emily and Effi

The Brontë Sisters (Anne Brontë; Emily Brontë; Charlotte Brontë)

R O'Hara Burke, c. 1861

Purchased 2009

Portrait 49

This issue features Jude Rae, Arthur Boyd, Darren McDonald, John Singer Sargent, Tom Wills the 'inventor' of Australian Rules Football and more.

My Lovely Sister

Georg von Neumayer, c. 1860

Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased with funds provided by Graham Smith 2009

Robert O'Hara Burke, c. 1860

Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2001

Australian Aboriginal Cricketers, 1867

Purchased with funds provided by L Gordon Darling AC CMG 2009

Robert O'Hara Burke, Leader of the Victorian Expedition, 1860-1861

Purchased with funds provided by Ross A Field 2007

Sidney Nolan, 1964

Purchased 2003

Joanna Gilmour

Joanna Gilmour is the Curator, Collection & Research at the National Portrait Gallery.

Who's Jo?

Find out about the curator of the exhibition.

Nolan Heads

Nolan Heads will focus on the portraiture of one of Australia's most original painters and one of the few to have achieved an international reputation

Paris to Monaro

After successfully exploring the art scenes of London, France and Morocco, Hilda Rix Nicholas settled at Knockalong, a property near Delegate, on the Monaro plain in the 1920s.

Charles Summers, late 1860s

Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased with funds provided by Graham Smith 2009

Little Darlings Youth Portrait Prize 2023

Little Darlings is for primary and secondary students, with four separate categories across Kindergarten to Year 12. Responding to the theme ‘Me and my place’, students painted, drew, photographed, printed or combined all of these to make their portrait.

Ada Bird Petyarre, 1990

Gift of Leo Christie 2003. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.

Powerful Indigenous women

June Oscar AO lauds three iconic Aboriginal figures in the Portrait Gallery collection who have inspired and influenced her.

Alluring Performance Brings Gallery to Life

See the Gallery through a different lens and experience the portraits with a unique sensorial performance of movement, voice and live sound.

Bob Hawke, 2012

Purchased 2013

William Robertson, 1866

Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Malcolm Robertson in memory of William Thomas Robertson 2018
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program

Portrait of His Excellency Sir Henry Barkly, Governor of Victoria, c. 1864

Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased with funds provided by The Ian Potter Foundation 2007

Jack Thompson, 2013

Purchased 2015

Lady Barkly, 1863

Purchased 2014

Gough Whitlam and Bob Hawke, c. 1976 (printed 2017)

Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2017

Tough & Tender

Art by Warwick Baker, Chris Burden, Larry Clark, Rozalind Drummond, Nan Goldin, Robert Mapplethorpe and Collier Schorr explores personal relations, individual expression and fluid identity.

I'm not there

Gloria Petyarre, 1994

Gift of Patrick Corrigan AM 2004. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.

Self portrait (Hilda in the Chinoise hat), c. 1913

Gift of Bronwyn Wright 2013. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.

Portrait Gallery benefits from generous Boxer bequest

Canberran and modernist art collector Alan Boxer has generously bequeathed two works by artists Arthur Boyd and Jenny Sages to the National Portrait Gallery.

Ludwig Becker, 1861

Purchased with funds provided by the Australian Decorative and Fine Arts Society Canberra 2000

Russell Page in Venice, 1997

Purchased 2002

Gloria Petyarre, 2005

Gift of the artist 2010. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.

Sidney Nolan, Western Australia, 1962 (printed 2000)

Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of the artist 2001. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
The series 'David Moore: From Face to Face' was acquired as a gift of the artist and with financial assistance from Timothy Fairfax AC and L Gordon Darling AC CMG 2001.

Portraits for Posterity

Drawn from some of the many donations made to the Gallery's collection, the exhibition Portraits for Posterity pays homage both to the remarkable (and varied) group of Australians who are portrayed in the portraits and the generosity of the many donors who have presented them to the Gallery.

Paths to portraiture

The life and art of Australian artist Jenny Sages is on display in the exhibition Paths to Portraiture.

Open Air

Open Air is an exhibition of portraits of Australians in environments of particular significance to them.

Headspace 7

Headspace 7: Me and My Place, the seventh in the National Portrait Gallery's series of student exhibitions, will be presented at Commonwealth Place. Me and My Place is the curatorial theme for the 2006 exhibition.

Secure the shadow ere the substance fade

The tragic tale of Tom Wills, the ‘inventor’ of Australian Rules Football.

Great Suffragette demonstration in London, 1911

Purchased 2011

Annual Appeal

Through blue eyes

Works by Arthur Boyd and Sidney Nolan bring the desert, the misty seashore and the hot Monaro plains to exhibition Open Air: Portraits in the landscape.

Matthew Burnett, c. 1865

Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2015

Sideshow Alley

Death masks, post-mortem drawings and other spooky and disquieting portraits... Come and see how portraits of infamous Australians were used in the 19th century.

Time and light

This sample of 56 photographs takes in some of the smallest photographs we own and some of the largest, some of the earliest and some of the most recent, as well as multiple photographic processes from daguerreotypes to digital media.

The Fairfax Gift

This article examines the portraits gifted to the National Portrait Gallery by Fairfax Holdings in 2003.

National Youth Self Portrait Prize

An annual event, the National Youth Self Portrait Prize seeks to encourage young people to embrace self portraiture and its expressive possibilities.

2020 Annual Appeal

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

Recognition

Originally conceived as an anthropological record, Percy Leason’s powerful 1934 portraits of Victorian Aboriginal people are today considered to be a highlight of 20th century Australian portraiture

Martha Mary Robertson, 1866

Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Malcolm Robertson in memory of William Thomas Robertson 2018
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program

National Photographic Portrait Prize 2022

The exhibition is selected from a national field of entries, reflecting the distinctive vision of Australia's aspiring and professional portrait photographers and the unique nature of their subjects.

William St. Leonards Robertson, c. 1869

Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Malcolm Robertson in memory of William Thomas Robertson 2018
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program

2021 Annual Appeal

In 2021 the Annual Appeal was focussed on Peter Brew-Bevan's portraits of athletes Turia Pitt, Leisel Jones OAM and Ellie Cole OAM.

National Photographic Portrait Prize 2009

In its second year at the National Portrait Gallery, and for the first time touring to other venues, the National Photographic Portrait Prize 2009 continues to present surprising perspectives on the nature of contemporary portrait photography.

True Stories

The story behind the creation of the portrait of Helen Garner by Jenny Sages.

Nicholas Chevalier, c. 1867

Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased with funds provided by Graham Smith 2009

The house, the horse, the wife and the offspring

Joanna Gilmour writes about the portraiture of the colonial artist William Nicholas.

Robert Kermode, c. 1840

Purchased 2008. The original frame for this work was donated to the National Portrait Gallery of Australia by the National Gallery of Victoria 2009.

Martha Kermode, c. 1840

Purchased 2008. The original frame for this work was donated to the National Portrait Gallery of Australia by the National Gallery of Victoria 2009.

Husbands and Wives

'I have just been to my dressing case to take a peep at you.

Australian Visit

The exhibition will include works of art from the NPG Canberra's permanent collection with some inward loans and aims to highlight the achievements of notable Australians.

The Final Frontier

Magda Keaney talks with Montalbetti+Campbell about their photographic portrait of Australian astronaut Andy Thomas.

First Ladies

First Ladies profiles women who have achieved noteworthy firsts over the past 100 years.

NPPP 2009 exhibition essay

Dr Christopher Chapman, National Photographic Portrait Prize judge and curator, introduces the 2009 Prize.

Primed

Seventeen of Australia’s thirty prime ministers to date are represented in the contrasting sizes, moods and mediums of these portraits.

Uncommon Australians

This exhibition showcases portraits acquired through the generosity of the National Portrait Gallery’s Founding Patrons, L Gordon Darling AC CMG and Marilyn Darling AC.

A handful of sand

Ellen Kent examines the portrait of Vincent Lingiari and Prime Minister Gough Whitlam taken by photographer Mervyn Bishop.

Joan Alone

Julia Gillard pays poignant tribute to her friend and mentor, the late Joan Kirner, Victoria’s first and only female premier.

A real Pratt

The death of a gentlewoman is shrouded in mystery, a well-liked governor finds love after sorrow, and two upright men become entangled in the historical record.

In the round

Andrew Sayers outlines the highlights of the National Portrait Gallery's display of portrait sculpture.

Louise Whelan

I met Kaloti Parmjit the day I took the photo. I first visited the Sikh temple in the suburb of Glenwood to take photos as part of a social documentary project I'm undertaking for the State Library of NSW.

Shadows of light

Mark Haworth-Booth explains why Bill Brandt is one of the most important British photographers of the Twentieth Century.

Giving and getting

The exhibition Portraits for Posterity celebrates gifts to the Gallery, of purchases made with donated funds, and testifies to the generosity and community spirit of Australians.

Illuminating history

Joanna Gilmour reflects on 25 years of collecting at the National Portrait Gallery.

Washington preview

Ron Ramsey, former Director of Cultural Relations at the Embassy of Australia interviewed NPG Washington Director, Marc Pachter, about their building renovations.

Picture this...

This edited version of a speech by Andrew Sayers examines some of the antecedents of the National Portrait Gallery and set out the ideas behind the modern Gallery and its collection.

An Australian story

In his speech launching the new National Portrait Gallery building on 3 December 2008, then Prime Minister Kevin Rudd set the Gallery in a national and historical context.

The Multifarious Career of George Selth Coppin

George Selth Coppin (1819-1906) comedian, impresario and entrepreneur, was a driving force of the early Australian theatre.

Give me five

National Portrait Gallery director Karen Quinlan AM nominates her quintet of favourites from the collection, with early twentieth-century ‘selfies’ filling the roster.

Take thy face hence

Joanna Gilmour travels through time to explore the National Portrait Gallery London’s masterpieces in Shakespeare to Winehouse.

Women make history

Jennifer Higgie uncovers the intriguing stories behind portraits of women by women in the National Portrait Gallery’s collection.

Money for Myth

Australian character on the market by Jane Raffan.

The 'I' in Indigenous art

Jane Raffan examines unique styles of Indigenous portraiture that challenge traditional Western concepts of the artform.

Lovingly observed

Sarah Engledow previews the beguiling summer exhibition, Idle hours.

A feast of friends

John Singer Sargent: a painter at the vanguard of contemporary movements in music, literature and theatre.

Portrait Donors

The Black Death

The best horror stories are real. A flea sinks its proboscis into the skin of a sick black rat, feeds on its blood, and ingests lethally multiplying bacteria.

You are who?

Joanna Gilmour reflects on merging collections and challenging traditional assumptions around portraiture in WHO ARE YOU.

Some prime ministers

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