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William Buckley (1780-1856), known as 'the wild white man', was transported for life in 1802 for receiving stolen cloth.
1 portrait in the collection
Purchased 2009
Anthony Buckley and Constantine are portrait photographers by appointment to Their Royal Highnesses Queen Elizabeth II and the Duke of Edinburgh.
1 portrait in the collection
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of L Gordon Darling AC CMG 2001
Purchased 2013
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2012
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2014
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2016
Purchased 2010
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2011
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Caltex Australia Ltd 2008
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased with funds provided by L Gordon Darling AC CMG 2003
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Malcolm Robertson in memory of William Thomas Robertson 2018
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Malcolm Robertson in memory of William Thomas Robertson 2018. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Purchased 2022
Purchased 2022
Gift of the artist 2022. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Purchased 2022
Purchased 2022
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of John McPhee 2018
Purchased 2015
Gift of Malcolm Robertson in memory of William Thomas Robertson 2018. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Malcolm Robertson tells the family history of one of Australia's earliest patrons of the arts, his Scottish born great great great grandfather, William Robertson.
The draftsman and engraver William Evans reproduced many of Sir William Beechey’s portraits including that of King George..
3 portraits in the collection
William Yang's art is about the telling of stories, his work is an intriguing mixture of philosophy, autobiography, social history and documentary imbued with a sense of the artist's own curiosity, humanity and humour
William Mora (1953–2023), art dealer and gallerist, was the eldest son of artist Mirka Mora and restauranteur and gallery owner Georges Mora.
1 portrait in the collection
William Robertson junior studied at Oxford University and is said to have been the first Australian to row in an Oxford eight, his team victorious in the Boat Race of 1861.
5 portraits in the collection
William Henry Fernyhough (1809-1849) was a sketcher, silhouette artist, lithographer and draughtsman who immigrated to Sydney in 1836.
13 portraits in the collection
William Lanne (1834-1869), also known as King Billy or William Laney, is said to have been Truganini's third partner.
3 portraits in the collection
William Nicholas was born near London and is believed to have trained with English printmaker A.M Huffam.
2 portraits in the collection
Sir William Beechey, portrait painter and pupil of Johann Zoffany, was greatly influenced by Sir Joshua Reynolds.
1 portrait in the collection
William Yang on his heritage and becoming a photographer in the 70s.
William Johnson was a commercial photographer who operated a studio on the corner of Pitt and Market Streets in Sydney from the 1890s to the 1920s.
4 portraits in the collection
William Ridley, stipple engraver, worked as an illustrator for a variety of magazines.
5 portraits in the collection
William Hodges (1744-1797) trained from an early age at William Shipley's drawing school at Castle Court in the Strand, and was afterward apprenticed to a landscape painter.
3 portraits in the collection
William Dickinson (1746-1823) was a London-born draughtsman, engraver and print publisher.
1 portrait in the collection
Francis William Barnard Walford (1821–1896), businessman and landowner, was born in Hobart, the son of Barnard Walford (1801–1846), a publican and victualler; and the grandson of Barnard Walford senior (c.
1 portrait in the collection
William Insull Burman came to Victoria in 1853 and worked as a painter and decorator before establishing his own photography business in Carlton in about 1863.
1 portrait in the collection
William H. Bardwell, photographer, worked at various premises in Ballarat from 1858 until 1895.
1 portrait in the collection
William Howitt (1792–1879), author, arrived in Victoria in 1852 having worked as a farmer, druggist, alderman and writer in England.
1 portrait in the collection
William Owen moved to London from his native Shropshire in 1786 and was apprenticed for seven years to the coach-painter Charles Catton.
1 portrait in the collection
William Paul Dowling (1824–1877) is thought to have studied art in his native Dublin before settling in London, where he worked as a draughtsman while trying to establish himself as a portraitist.
1 portrait in the collection
The Reverend William Singleton (c. 1804-1875), Anglican clergyman, graduated from Trinity College Dublin in 1826 and was ordained in the city’s Christ Church Cathedral in 1841.
1 portrait in the collection
William Wentworth (1790-1872) was a landowner, barrister and statesman.
2 portraits in the collection
Sir William (Will) Ashton OBE (1881-1963) was the son of James Ashton, who founded Adelaide's Norwood Art School in 1885 and its Academy of Arts in 1895.
1 portrait in the collection
William Robinson AO (b. 1936) is one of Australia's most distinguished and influential contemporary painters, known for his distinctive and prolific output as landscape painter in particular.
3 portraits in the collection
William Strutt arrived in Melbourne in 1850 having undertaken his training in art in Paris in the late 1830s.
1 portrait in the collection
William Latimer (1851-1934) was a portrait photographer who worked in Melbourne in the latter part of the nineteenth century.
1 portrait in the collection
William Daniell (1769-1837) worked mostly as a topographical draftsman and engraver in aquatint.
4 portraits in the collection
William Edwin 'Wep' Pidgeon, cartoonist, illustrator and painter was born in Paddington and studied art at the JS Watkins School and East Sydney Technical College.
2 portraits in the collection
Sir William Dargie CBE (1912–2003) studied at the Melbourne Technical College, and then in the studio of AD Colquhoun from 1931 to 1934.
22 portraits in the collection
Sir William Windeyer (1834-1897) was a politician and judge. One of the first undergraduates to study at the University of Sydney, he developed a particular interest in education and the rights of women - he was responsible for the Married Women's Property Act of 1879, and was Founding Chairman of the university's Women's College.
4 portraits in the collection
William McLellan (1831–1906), miner and parliamentarian, served on the Victorian Legislative Assembly from 1859 to 1877, and again between 1883 and 1897.
1 portrait in the collection
William Griffith (c. 1808-1870) emigrated to Australia around 1840 and moved to Parramatta with his wife, Susan, whom he had married ten days after landing in Sydney.
1 portrait in the collection
William Howitt, woodcarver and sculptor, began his career in the UK, decorating ships’ interiors and working on ecclesiastical items.
1 portrait in the collection
William Yang (b. 1943) is a pre-eminent Australian photographer known for an intensely sustained body of work that examines issues of cultural and sexual identity, and which unflinchingly documents the lives of his friends and community and his own lived experience with curiosity, sensitivity and humour.
15 portraits in the collection
Alfred William Cox (1857–1919), racehorse owner and breeder, was born in Liverpool, England, the son of a successful cotton broker.
1 portrait in the collection
William Lamb, second Viscount Melbourne (1779–1848), statesman, was Prime Minister of Britain in 1834 and from 1835 to 1841.
2 portraits in the collection
William Kelly OAM (b. 1943) was born in Buffalo, New York and was a steelworker before becoming a student at the Philadelphia College of Art.
2 portraits in the collection
Sir William Northam CBE (1905-1988), yachtsman, won the gold medal in the 5.5 m class event at the 1964 Tokyo Olympics.
1 portrait in the collection
William Robertson (1798-1874), pastoralist and entrepreneur, was a key player in the settlement of Victoria in the 1830s.
3 portraits in the collection
Sir William Deane AC KBE KC (b. 1931), High Court judge, was governor-general of Australia from early 1996 to mid-2001.
1 portrait in the collection
William Dakin (1883-1950), zoologist, studied in his native England and, as an Exhibition scholar, in Kiel, Germany.
1 portrait in the collection
Sir William Dobell (1899–1970), painter, studied art and was apprentice to an architect in Sydney before leaving Australia for Europe in 1929.
10 portraits in the collection
William Macleod, artist and magazine proprietor, attended the Sydney Mechanics’ School of Arts as a young teenager and saw his first illustration published in 1866.
4 portraits in the collection
William Westall (1781-1850), grew up in London and was taught to draw by his elder half-brother Richard, who was drawing master to Princess Victoria.
1 portrait in the collection
William Francis King (1807-1873), aka 'The Flying Pieman', accomplished a series of bizarre athletic feats during the 1840s.
1 portrait in the collection
William Dampier (1651-1715), seafarer and writer, had spent a good deal of time at sea as a buccaneer and merchant sailor before he spent three months in 1688 around King Sound (northern Western Australia) on the Cygnet.
1 portrait in the collection
William Bligh (1754-1817), naval officer, was born in Plymouth and first went to sea at around the age of eight.
3 portraits in the collection
Sir William Francis Drummond Jervois (1821-1897), governor, attended the Royal Military Academy before being commissioned to the Royal Engineers in 1839.
1 portrait in the collection
Bill Beach (1850-1935), sculler, came to New South Wales as a young boy with his English parents, who settled at Albion Park, NSW.
1 portrait in the collection
Recorded 1965
Recorded 1965
Recorded 1960
Recorded 2022
Recorded 1961
Recorded 1961
Celebrated Sydney-based photographer and performer William Yang was commissioned by the National Portrait Gallery to produce a new performance work that premiered at the opening of the Gallery's new building.
Purchased 2022
Purchased 2022
Purchased 2022
Purchased 2022
Purchased 2022
Purchased 2022
Gift of L Gordon Darling AC CMG in recognition of Sir William Dargie's role in the establishment of the National Gallery of Australia 2002. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Purchased 2015
William Yang shares the stories behind his autobiographical self portraits that celebrate his cultural heritage and identity.
Recorded 1960
Arthur William Burman was one of the nine children of photographer William Insull Burman (1814-1890), who came to Victoria in 1853.
2 portraits in the collection
William Kinghorne (1796-1878) came to the colonies from Scotland some time before 1824.
1 portrait in the collection
Edward William Knox (1847-1933), industrialist, was the second of four surviving sons of Sir Edward Knox, founder of the Colonial Sugar Refining Co, and his wife Martha Rutledge (sister of merchant, banker and settler William Rutlege).
3 portraits in the collection
Sir William John Macleay (1820-1891), pastoralist, politician, collector and promoter of science, had just begun to study medicine in his native Scotland when family circumstances dictated his migration to New South Wales.
1 portrait in the collection
William Pitt the Younger (1759-1806) was Tory prime minister of Great Britain from 1783 to 1801, and of United Kingdom from 1804 to 1806.
1 portrait in the collection
William Wolfe Alais engraved a number of plates for the journal The World of Fashion.
1 portrait in the collection
Sir William Hillier Onslow was Governor New Zealand at the Constitutional Convention, Sydney, 1891.
1 portrait in the collection
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Richard King 2008
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program
William Morris Hughes (1862-1952) was Labor and National Party Prime Minister of Australia from 1915 to 1923.
4 portraits in the collection
William John Wills (1834-1861) came to Victoria with his brother in early 1853.
3 portraits in the collection
Gift of Danina Anderson, daughter of Max Dupain 2017.
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Richard King 2008
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program
Sir Robert William Duff (1835–1895) was governor of New South Wales from May 1893 until March 1895.
2 portraits in the collection
William Henry Harvey (1811-1866), botanist, formed a boyhood passion for natural history which was encouraged at Ballitore School, County Kildare.
1 portrait in the collection
William Saurin Lyster (1828–1880) was an Irish operatic impresario who introduced serious opera to the colonies.
2 portraits in the collection
Gift of the family of Sir Victor and Lady Windeyer 2009. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
William Jackson Hooker (1785–1865), botanist, was the first Director of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, in which capacity he had significant influence on the study of Australian flora.
1 portrait in the collection
Sir William John Lyne (1844-1913), politician, was a Premier of New South Wales and a minister in the first Australian parliament.
1 portrait in the collection
William Edward (Bill) Harney (1895–1962), bushman and raconteur, spent his childhood in Charters Towers and Cairns and started working as a stockman and boundary rider at the age of twelve.
2 portraits in the collection
William Hardy Wilson (1881-1955) - or Hardy Wilson, as he styled himself - is regarded as one of the most significant and visionary Australian architects of the twentieth century.
1 portrait in the collection
William Clark Haines (1810-1866), first premier of Victoria, was educated at Charterhouse and Caius College Cambridge and practised as a surgeon in England before sailing to Victoria in 1842.
1 portrait in the collection
William Baker Ashton (1800-1854) was the first governor of Adelaide Gaol.
1 portrait in the collection
Purchased 2003
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Dr Robert Edwards AO 1999
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Dr Robert Edwards AO 1999
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of the CSIRO Agriculture and Food Division 2017
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Dr Robert Edwards AO 1999
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Dr Robert Edwards AO 1999
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program
Gift of Dr Robert Edwards AO 1999. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Dr Robert Edwards AO 1999
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Dr Robert Edwards AO 1999
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Dr Robert Edwards AO 1999
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Dr Robert Edwards AO 1999
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program
Gift of the artist 2015
William John Pickett Bedford (1805–1869) was the eldest of three children of Anglican clergyman, William Bedford (1781–1852), and his wife, Eleanor, and came to Van Diemen’s Land with his family in 1823 following the appointment of his father to a chaplaincy in the colony.
1 portrait in the collection
Gift of the Estate of Leslie Walford AM 2013
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2017
An interview with photographer William Yang who recalls his encounters with the author Patrick White.
Gift of Fiona Turner (née Robertson) and John Robertson 2011. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Gift of Fiona Turner (née Robertson) and John Robertson 2011. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
The life of William Bligh offers up a handful of the most remarkable episodes in the history of Britain’s eighteenth and early nineteenth-century maritime empire.
Gift of the Simpson family in memory of Caroline Simpson OAM 2008. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
William Lygon, 7th Earl Beauchamp (1872-1938), governor, was appointed to the position of Governor of NSW in 1899.
1 portrait in the collection
Sir William Dargie, painter and eight times winner of the Archibald Prize for portraiture, died in Melbourne on July 26, 2003, aged 91.
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2015
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2010
Unique in the world, perhaps, is a bronze sculpture that fuses the age-old human portrait bronze tradition, and the later genre of the bronze pug figurine: that’d be William Robinson’s Self-portrait with pug.
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased with funds provided by Graham Smith 2009
Gift of the family of FW Macpherson 2010
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2013
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Leigh Purcell 2012
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.
Purchased 2011
Purchased with funds provided by the Liangis family 2015
Sir Tannatt William Edgeworth David KBE (1858-1934) was an eminent geologist.
2 portraits in the collection
William Birdwood KCMG KCSI KCB DSO, 1st Baron Birdwood of Anzac and Totnes (1865-1951) commanded the Australian Corps for much of the First World War.
1 portrait in the collection
Gift of the Windeyer family 2009
Gift of Ted and Gina Gregg 2012
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2011
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Mrs Lily Kahan 2017
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program
Gift of Patrick Corrigan AM 2004. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Recorded 1937
Gift of the Windeyer family 2009
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2013
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased with funds provided by the Sid and Fiona Myer Family Foundation 2017
Gift of the artist 2025. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Gift of the Windeyer family 2009. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2010
Gift of the MacMahon family in affectionate memory of Edward MacMahon and William Dobell 2015. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Purchased with funds provided by L Gordon Darling AC CMG 1999
Gift of Mrs Caroline Philippa Parker 2005. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Purchased 2022
Purchased 1998
Purchased 2003
Purchased 2003
Purchased 1998
Joanna Gilmour writes about the portraiture of the colonial artist William Nicholas.
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of the Australian War Memorial in association with the Fysh family 2008
Purchased 2003
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2012
Gift of the Simpson family in memory of Caroline Simpson OAM 2008. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2012
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2012
Purchased 2016
Gift of Dr Robert Edwards AO 1999. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Purchased with funds provided by Marilyn Darling AC and with the assistance of Philip Bacon Galleries 2000
Angus Trumble reveals the complex technical mastery behind a striking recent acquisition, Henry Bone’s enamel portrait of William Manning.
Gift of Arlette Perkins daughter of Sir Lawrence Wackett 2009. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Purchased 2010
Joanna Gilmour explores the 1790 portrait of William Bligh by Robert Dodd.
Sarah Engledow on Messrs Dobell and MacMahon and the art of friendship.
Scientists tend to conjure up images of men in white coats in labs but this is just one stereotype in an evolving history of how we have perceived scientists, and how their profession has been understood over the years.
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2010
Purchased 2009
Gift of BHP Billiton 2003. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of John Fairfax Holdings Ltd 2002
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2016
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2012
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of the family of FW Macpherson 2012
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2004
Gift of BHP Billiton 2003. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Gift of Coles Myer Ltd 2002. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Dr Robert Edwards AO 1999
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program
Purchased 2022
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Dr Robert Edwards AO 1999
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2014
Gift of Marlene McCarthy 2006. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Gift of Alcoa World Alumina Australia 2005. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Gina and Ted Gregg 2010
Gift of BHP Billiton 2003. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Gift of Coles Myer Ltd 2002. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Gift of Richard Due 2010
Gift of BHP Billiton 2003. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Gift of Coles Myer Ltd 2002. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Gift of Fiona Turner (née Robertson) and John Robertson 2011. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased with funds provided by
Allanah Dopson & Nicholas Heyward 2009
Twice rebelled against, and twice vindicated, William Bligh occupies an ambivalent space in Australian history. Angus Trumble, former Director of the National Portrait Gallery, explains.
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Malcolm Robertson in memory of William Thomas Robertson 2018
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Malcolm Robertson in memory of William Thomas Robertson 2018
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Malcolm Robertson in memory of William Thomas Robertson 2018
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Malcolm Robertson in memory of William Thomas Robertson 2018
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2011
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Paul and Wendy Greenhalgh 1999
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2009
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2016
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2009
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Mrs Lily Kahan 2017
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Ric Techow and Jenny Techow-Coleman in memory of Roy and Bet Techow 2001
Gift of David Lloyd Jones, in memory of his father, David Lloyd Jones 2021. Donated through Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Gift of HOTA (Home of the Arts), Gold Coast 2019 with the encouragement of Patrick Corrigan AM
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2009
Gift of the Simpson family in memory of Caroline Simpson OAM 2008. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Gift of John McPhee 2018
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2010
Grace Carroll on the gendered world of the Wentworths.
Purchased 1999
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.
Gift of the Estate of Alice Myra Foletta 2006
Gift of Coles Myer Ltd 2002. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Peter and Susan Dadswell 2015
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Ted and Gina Gregg 2012
Gift of David Hume OAM 2016
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2012
Gift of Alcoa World Alumina Australia 2005. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Gift of Rodney Davidson AO OBE 2014. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2012
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased with funds provided by Ross A Field 2008
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2010
Gift of Pamela Glasson 2009
Collected by Leila Haigh (nee Rouse)
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2016
Gift of the Simpson Family in memory of Caroline Simpson OAM 2008. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2016
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2013
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2012
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Pamela Glasson 2012
Collected by Leila Haigh (nee Rouse)
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2018
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased with funds provided by The Ian Potter Foundation 2007
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Ian Ross 2001
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2014
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2013
Gift of the Estate of the late Barbara Tribe 2009
Purchased 2008
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased with funds provided by the Liangis family 2012
Purchased 2010
Gift of Dr Mary Newlinds and Sheena Simpson in memory of their father, D.A.S. Campbell, 2014
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2012
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2015
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased with funds provided by Marilyn Darling AC 2013
Purchased 2014
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Ted and Gina Gregg 2012
Gift of the Estate of Marion Orme Page 2016
Purchased with funds provided by the Ian Potter Foundation 2008
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Ted and Gina Gregg 2012
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2010
Projecting the splendour of the empire, and the resolve of its subjects, the bust of William Birdwood keeps a stiff upper lip in the National Portrait Gallery.
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.
Purchased with funds provided by the Australian Decorative and Fine Arts Society Canberra 2000
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Ted and Gina Gregg 2012
Purchased 2006
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2019
Purchased 2015
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2001
Sir William Dobell painted the portraits of Sir Charles Lloyd Jones and Sir Hudson Fysh, who did much to promote the image of Australia in this country and abroad.
Joanna Gilmour recounts the story of ill-fated sea voyages in the early stages of the Antipodean colony.
Gift of the Estate of Marion Orme Page 2016
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Ted and Gina Gregg 2012
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased with funds provided by Robert Oatley AO 2007
Purchased 2015
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2014
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2018
Gift of Ronald A Walker 2009. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Ted and Gina Gregg 2012
Purchased with funds provided by Ross A Field 2007
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Ted and Gina Gregg 2012
Purchased with funds provided by L Gordon Darling AC CMG 2009
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Dr Peter Halliday in memory of Norah Knox 2010
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Ted and Gina Gregg 2012
Gift of Fiona Turner (née Robertson) and John Robertson 2011. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Gift of the Mort family 2009
Purchased 2013
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2015
Gift of the Sydney Airports Corporation 2001
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Ted and Gina Gregg 2012
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2012
Family affections are preserved in a fine selection of intimate portraits.
Purchased 2022
Elegance in exile is an exhibition surveying the work of Richard Read senior, Thomas Bock, Thomas Griffiths Wainewright and Charles Rodius: four artists who, though exiled to Australia as convicts, created many of the most significant and elegant portraits of the colonial period.
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2010
William Lister Lister (1859-1943), who was born in Sydney but taken to England as an eight-year-old, studied at the Bedford School of Art and in France before moving to Glasgow to study mechanical engineering at the College of Science and Mechanics.
1 portrait in the collection
Gift of the Estate of Nancy Wiseman 2007
Purchased 2009
Purchased 2009
As a tribute to Sir William Dargie's singular contribution to Australian art and cultural institutions, and on the occasion of his birthday, The Australian War Memorial, Parliament House and the National Portrait Gallery will mount exhibitions of his work between May and October
Adapted from A Tribute to William Dobell an exhibition presented by the Australian National University's Drill Hall Gallery in association with the Sir William Dobell Art Foundation, The National Gallery of Australia, and the Australian War Memorial. Dobell is of course, celebrated for his achievements in portraiture, winning the Archibald prize (1943, 1948 and 1959), the Wynne Prize (1948), and representing Australia at the 1954 Venice Biennale. Curator Mary Eagle concludes her essay in the catalogue of the exhibition thus, "Overall I see a dissonance in Dobell’s art and life
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2008
Adelaide of Saxe-Coburg Meiningen (1792–1849) was the consort of King William IV of England.
1 portrait in the collection
Purchased with the assistance of funds provided by the Australian Decorative and Fine Arts Society 2000
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of the Freer Tuckfield family 2010
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of the Freer Tuckfield family 2010
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program
Francis Tuckfield (1808-1865), Wesleyan missionary, was eighteen years old when, having worked as a miner and a fisherman, he decided to become a preacher.
1 portrait in the collection
Family fortunes
This issue of Portrait Magazine includes William Bligh, Lionel Rose, Richard Larter, Layne Beachley, William Yang and more.
Hi-resolution images for media representatives, password required.
Purchased 1999
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of the family of FW Macpherson 2012
Gift of the Estate of Leslie Walford AM 2013
As the first National Portrait Gallery travelling exhibition, The reflecting eye: portraits of Australian visual artists represents an important milestone in the history of Australia's National Portrait Gallery.
The Photographic Society of Victoria was formed in 1876 to 'bring photographers together in a friendly spirit, in order to advance the art and science of photography in the colony, without any attempt at binding or dictating to members any special trading rules, such as charges for photographs or hours or days for closing or opening their respective establishments.' At the time of the first annual meeting on 9 March 1877 there were 61 members, five whom were ladies.
1 portrait in the collection
Purchased with funds provided by the Liangis family 2014
Mashman Bros Ltd was established by William and Henry Mashman in Sydney in 1885.
1 portrait in the collection
Reginald Henry Jerrold-Nathan (1889-1979) arrived in Australia from London in 1924, having studied under John Singer Sargent and William Orpen at the Royal Academy, where he was awarded a medal for portrait painting.
2 portraits in the collection
Francis William Barnard Walford (1821–1896), businessman and landowner, was born in Hobart, the son of Barnard Walford (1801–1846), a publican and victualler; and the grandson of Barnard Walford senior (c.
1 portrait in the collection
This issue features Richard Avedon, Tracey Moffatt, Indigenous portraiture, William Kentridge, roller derby and more.
Claude Spurgeon Charlick (1893-1974), businessman, was managing director of the Adelaide firm Charlick Ltd for nearly forty years.
1 portrait in the collection
Inspiring Australians tell their own stories in a unique new gallery audio tour, developed in collaboration with the National Library of Australia.
Jessie Whyte (née Walker, 1779–1864). Born in Berwickshire, Scotland, Jessie married George Whyte (d.
1 portrait in the collection
The two portraits that I've chosen to compare and contrast and to bring together a self portrait by John Brack in 1955, and William Yang, Self Portrait #2.
Father Peter Steele AM (1939-2012), poet and Jesuit Provincial, grew up in Perth, destined from youth for the priesthood.
1 portrait in the collection
This issue of Portrait Magazine feature Lucian Frued, John Witzig, colonial death portraits, William Kinghorne, Henry Crock, and more.
This issue of Portrait Magazine features Deborah Mailman, the Presence and Absence exhibition of portrait sculpture, Sir William Dargie and more.
This issue features Vanity Fair, Nancy Bird Walton, William Barak, Sidney Kidman, Benjamin Duterrau's portraits of the Indigenous peoples of Tasmania, and more.
Gift of Malcolm Robertson in memory of William Thomas Robertson 2018. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Gift of Malcolm Robertson in memory of William Thomas Robertson 2018. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
William Read was active in London in the 1820s and 1830s and appears to have worked mainly as an engraver of portraits.
1 portrait in the collection
Gift of Malcolm Robertson in memory of William Thomas Robertson 2018. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Malcolm Robertson in memory of William Thomas Robertson 2018
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Malcolm Robertson in memory of William Thomas Robertson 2018
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Malcolm Robertson in memory of William Thomas Robertson 2018
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Malcolm Robertson in memory of William Thomas Robertson 2018
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program
John Lucas started his career as an apprentice to the engraver Samuel William Reynolds.
1 portrait in the collection
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Commissioned with funds provided by Angela Nevill, Nevill Keating Pictures Ltd, in memory of William Keating 2001
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Commissioned with funds provided by Angela Nevill, Nevill Keating Pictures Ltd, in memory of William Keating 2001
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Commissioned with funds provided by Angela Nevill, Nevill Keating Pictures Ltd, in memory of William Keating 2001
The National Portrait Gallery will, next Tuesday, unveil an exciting new acquisition of irrefutable importance to all Australians. Portrait of William Bligh, in master’s uniform c. 1776, attributed to John Webber, is one of the earliest portraits of the contentious, historical figure, and extends the Gallery’s remarkable collection of early colonial portraits.
Purchased 2018
Desperately seeking Woolner medallions
Purchased 2019
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Malcolm Robertson in memory of William Thomas Robertson 2018. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Dr Arthur Martin a’Beckett FRCS (1812-1871) surgeon and New South Wales parliamentarian studied at London University from 1831 before undertaking a residency in Paris, centre for innovation in the practice of hygiene, pathological anatomy and physiopathology.
2 portraits in the collection
Terry Clune (b. 1932), gallerist, established Terry Clune Galleries with Frank MacDonald at 59 McLeay Street Potts Point in 1957.
1 portrait in the collection
William Beckwith (Bill) McInnes (1889–1939), artist, was only fourteen when he began studying drawing under Frederick McCubbin at the National Gallery School in Melbourne, before moving to painting.
5 portraits in the collection
Pride, protest, panache
Featuring 130 works across painting, film, photography, screen printing, sculpture, and then some – it explores our inner worlds, outer selves, intimacy, isolation, celebrity and more.
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Malcolm Robertson in memory of William Thomas Robertson 2018
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program
Elizabeth Fairfax (née Jesson, 1778–1861), colonial free settler, was born in Birmingham and around 1800 married William Fairfax, whose family had previously held estates in Barford, Warwickshire.
1 portrait in the collection
Sonia McMahon (1932-2010) née Hopkins, was the wife of William McMahon, Australian prime minister in 1971-1972.
1 portrait in the collection
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2014
My Favourite Australian is a project developed in collaboration with ABC TV and the people of Australia.
Elizabeth Roberts (1812–1833) was the daughter of Warwickshire-born William Roberts (1754–1819) and his wife, Jane (née Longhurst, c.
1 portrait in the collection
Thomas Cook produced portraits for the Gentleman's Magazine and frontispieces for book publishers, as well as a number of single plates in different genres for Boydell.
1 portrait in the collection
For Tom Roberts - Australia's best nineteenth-century portrait painter - neither a proto-national portrait gallery nor more popular collections of portrait heads, were sufficient public celebrations for the notables of Australian history
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2014
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased with funds provided by Graham Smith 2009
This exhibition expresses the joy and warmth that many of us derive from our animal companions, and celebrates their trusting, unpretentious ways, with portraits of Australians and their furry, feathered and fluffy friends.
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of John Fairfax Holdings Ltd 2002
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program
Fradelle & Marshall was a photographic and miniature-painting partnership between Albert Eugene Fradelle & William Shury Marshall, who maintained two studios in Regent Street, Westminster, London from 1872 to 1876.
1 portrait in the collection
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Dr Peter Halliday in memory of Norah Knox 2010
Gift of J.B. Windeyer 2018
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2010
Angus Trumble ponders the many faces of William Bligh.
James Freeman, who is credited with bringing the wet-plate photographic process to New South Wales, arrived in Sydney in 1854 to join his brother William, who had arrived the year before.
9 portraits in the collection
Georges Mora (1913-1992) was born Gunter Morawski to a Leipzig Jewish bourgeois family of Polish descent.
1 portrait in the collection
Purchased 2006
Meg Padgham studied at East Sydney Technical College and the Meldrum School.
1 portrait in the collection
To celebrate his family bicentenary, Malcolm Robertson looks at the portraiture legacy left by his ancestors.
Dr Christopher Chapman looks at the life of Wurundjeri elder William Barak through the portrait painted by Victor de Pury in 1899.
Saul Solomon (1836–1929) had a studio in Main Road, Ballarat from 1857 to 1862, and worked in partnership with William Bardwell at 29 Sturt Street, Ballarat until 1874.
1 portrait in the collection
Sean Hutton was born in Edinburgh, Scotland, and lives and works in Sydney.
1 portrait in the collection
William Yang on his autobiographical self portraits, David Parker's 1970s and 80s Melbourne music photographs, seven-time NPPP finalist Chris Budgeon, and Benjamin Warlngundu Ellis.
Dame Mary Gilmore DBE (1865–1962), poet, journalist and social reformer, was born near Goulburn and had an itinerant childhood as her father moved the family around New South Wales for work.
3 portraits in the collection
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2012
Maria Windeyer (née Camfield, 1795–1878), landowner, emigrated to New South Wales in 1835 with her husband Richard, a barrister, and their infant son, William Charles.
2 portraits in the collection
Thomas Heathfield Carrick, miniature painter, grew up in Carlisle, where he trained and traded as a chemist, painting miniatures in his spare time.
1 portrait in the collection
Martha Knox (née Rutledge, d. 1903), was the sister of merchant, landowner and banker William Rutledge.
1 portrait in the collection
Eleven works by Brett Whiteley, centred around his scintillating 'Patrick White at Centennial Park 1979-1980'.
In their own words lead researcher Louise Maher on the novel project that lets the Gallery’s portraits speak for themselves.
POL was a magazine that ran from 1969 to 1986
Ernest Buckmaster grew up in country Victoria, where his facility for art was recognised early on.
1 portrait in the collection
Beruk (William Barak) (1824-1903), an elder of the Wurundjeri clan of the Woi-worung, was the most famous Aboriginal person in Victoria in the 1890s.
1 portrait in the collection
Victor Greenhalgh (1900-1983) was a sculptor and teacher who greatly influenced tertiary art education; he was one of the first Victorian sculptors to adopt a modern style.
5 portraits in the collection
Robert Dunkarton, engraver and portrait painter, served his apprenticeship with mezzotint engraver William Pether.
1 portrait in the collection
David Collins (1756–1810), lieutenant-governor, began his career in the British Navy, rising to the rank of captain before being returning to dry land and being placed on half-pay in late 1783.
1 portrait in the collection
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2011
Margaret Robertson (née Whyte, 1811–1866) was the daughter of settlers George and Jessie Whyte, who emigrated to Van Diemen’s Land from Scotland in 1832.
4 portraits in the collection
For many years Elizabeth Chong has shared her love of Chinese cuisine with Australian audiences.
1 portrait in the collection
This display celebrates 100 years of the Historic Memorials Collection and its role in commissioning portraits of parliamentary and judicial figures in Australia.
Marri Ngarr artist Ryan Presley’s major installation greets you as you arrive at the Gallery, in a work that invites conversations about the ongoing legacies of colonisation.
Elliott & Fry, a photography studio and photographic film manufacturer, was founded in 1863 at 55-56 Baker Street, London by Joseph John Elliott and Clarence Edmund Fry.
2 portraits in the collection
Purchased 2001
Purchased 2006
Charles Alfred Woolley (1834-1922), photographer and sketcher, ran a studio on Macquarie Street in Hobart from 1859 to 1870, producing numerous portraits along with views and stereographs of Hobart and surrounding areas.
6 portraits in the collection
National Portrait Gallery Director Angus Trumble is ending his five-year tenure with a flourish, after announcing that Gallery publication Dempsey’s People: A Folio of British Street Portraits 1824-1844 has been awarded the 2018 William MB Berger Prize for British Art History.
The ‘first Australian first-class cricket team to tour England and North America’ was in fact the second Australian cricket side to contest matches internationally (a team of Indigenous players having done so in 1868), but it is considered the first official national representative team to tour overseas.
1 portrait in the collection
Luigi Schiavonetti, Italian reproductive engraver and etcher, studied art for several years before being employed by an engraver named Testolini to execute imitations of Bartolozzi's works, which Testolini passed off as his own.
1 portrait in the collection
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.
James Quinn was born in Melbourne and trained at the NGV School before studying in Paris from the mid-1890s to 1902.
1 portrait in the collection
Photographer Hari Ho describes the creation of his portrait of Papunya Tula artist Makinti Napanangka.
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
Sasha Grishin AM (birth date undisclosed) is the Sir William Dobell Professor of Art History at the Australian National University.
1 portrait in the collection
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2005
Gift of Fiona Turner (née Robertson) and John Robertson 2011. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Rudy Komon (1908-1982) was an art dealer and gallery director. After working as a journalist in Czechoslovakia, where he served with the Czech resistance during the war, he emigrated to Sydney and opened an antique store.
3 portraits in the collection
Barbering manuals of the turn of the century might describe this style as a ‘Van Dyck’, named after the Dutch painter Anthony van Dyck (1599–1641) who is known to have adopted this look.
Portraits of Australia’s pioneering psychologists and artworks by artists fascinated by the subconscious mind.
Purchased 2008. The original frame for this work was donated to the National Portrait Gallery of Australia by the National Gallery of Victoria 2009.
Purchased 2008. The original frame for this work was donated to the National Portrait Gallery of Australia by the National Gallery of Victoria 2009.
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2013
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of the artist 2005
Photographers Andrew Taylor and George Taylor opened their first studio in Cannon Street in east London in 1866.
1 portrait in the collection
This unique exhibition will give an insight into the private lives, pursuits and work of all the Nobel laureates associated with Australia
Henry Bryan Hall grew up in England and began his trade as an apprentice to the engravers Benjamin Smith and Henry Meyer.
1 portrait in the collection
Liverpool-born William Buelow Gould (1803-1853) had worked as a draftsman for the London printmaker, Rudolph Ackermann, and as a painter for a Staffordshire pottery before being transported to Van Diemen’s Land for theft in 1827.
1 portrait in the collection
Joshua Smith studied sculpture with Rayner Hoff and took classes in drawing and painting at Julian Ashton's Sydney Art School.
6 portraits in the collection
Sir Harry Holdsworth Rawson GCB GCMG (1843–1910) was appointed governor of New South Wales in January 1902 having distinguished himself in the course of various conflicts as an officer of the Royal Navy.
1 portrait in the collection
Gift of Mr Ronald Walker 2001
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 1999
Finalist, iD2012
Purchased with funds provided by the Liangis family 2013
Laura Praeger (née Blundell) was born in Tunbridge Wells, Kent, and was about twelve years old when her father brought his family to Australia, settling in Queensland.
1 portrait in the collection
Purchased 2018
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of the artist 2003
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program
Country, culture, connection
Purchased 2014
Edward MacMahon CBE (1904–1987), surgeon, studied medicine at the University of Sydney and completed his residency at the Sydney Hospital.
1 portrait in the collection
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2015
Alphonse Pellion, artist and naval draughtsman, was a midshipman aboard l'Uranie on Louis de Freycinet's three-year scientific and ethnographic expedition around the world in 1817-1820.
2 portraits in the collection
Sir George Young (1732–1810), naval officer, first went to sea at the age of fourteen and saw action in Europe and India before joining the East India Company’s marine in 1753.
1 portrait in the collection
Johannes Heyer was born at Germantown (Grovedale) near Geelong in Victoria.
1 portrait in the collection
Samuel Johnson Woolf, American painter, lithographer and illustrator, was born in New York City and named after the English essayist Samuel Johnson.
1 portrait in the collection
Purchased 2009
Idle hours is an exhibition of luxurious beauty. Paintings, prints and drawings represent subjects in quiet moods and situations arranged according to the time of day they depict - reading, drawing, snoozing, bathing, sewing, gardening, sitting, looking, making love and spending tranquil time with companions. Works in the exhibition range from the beginning of the twentieth century to the present.
This exhibition focuses on exploring national and communal identity through sculptural production in Australia, from the early decades of settlement through to the present day
Purchased 2017
Roderick Shaw (1915-1992) is perhaps best known for his worker paintings of the social realist school, such as Cable Layers (in the Art Gallery of NSW).
2 portraits in the collection
Purchased 2009
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of the artist 2003
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program
Gift of the late May Ralph 2019
Purchased with funds provided by Timothy Fairfax AC 2003
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Robin MacQueen 2007
Charles is my wingman
Shirley 'Mum Shirl' Smith AO OBE (1921–1998), humanitarian, was a Wiradjuri woman.
1 portrait in the collection
Purchased 2013
Mungo MacCallum (1941–2020) was one of Australia's best-known political journalists.
1 portrait in the collection
Nick Mourtzakis (b. 1951) is Melbourne-based artist and teacher. Mourtzajkis migrated to Melbourne with his Greek family in the early 1950s and trained at the Preston Institute of Technology and Mercer House Teachers' College in the early 1970s.
3 portraits in the collection
Purchased 2015
Gift of the Windeyer family 2009. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Thomas Phillips was born in Dudley, Warwickshire and initially trained as a glass painter before moving to London, aged 20, with a letter of introduction to the painter Benjamin West.
6 portraits in the collection
Purchased 2014
Julian Smith, surgeon and photographer, came to Australia with his family from England at the age of three.
2 portraits in the collection
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2017
Talented wife for a talented husband
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2015
When opposites attract
Elizabeth Sarah Ellen Carter (née Hill, 1845-1927) was one of the eight children born to Sydney cabinetmaker and undertaker John Hill jnr and his wife Elizabeth - the step-daughter of ex-convict boatman, John Cadman.
1 portrait in the collection
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2001
Tasmanian-born Andrew Bonneau (b. 1981) lives and works in Cairns, Queensland.
2 portraits in the collection
Books, beets and heat
Gift of Julie Friedeberger 2021
Jessie Robertson (1835–1849) was the eldest of the seven children of pastoralist and businessman, William Robertson (1798–1874), and his wife Margaret (née Whyte, 1811–1866).
1 portrait in the collection
Purchased 2015
Chadwick William Morgan OAM (1933-2025) performed comic country songs for more than 60 years.
2 portraits in the collection
Purchased 2010
Louise Forthun (b. 1959), artist, works primarily in painting and printmaking and has an aesthetic and conceptual focus on the architectural landscape of Australia's urban environments.
1 portrait in the collection
Victoria (1819–1901) was Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 1837 until her death in 1901.
8 portraits in the collection
George Richmond, son of the miniature painter Thomas Richmond, grew up in London, took early artistic instruction from his father and enrolled in the Royal Academy Schools in 1824.
1 portrait in the collection
English lithographer and watercolourist Henry Heath Glover (c. 1810-1858) emigrated to South Australia in 1848 with his two sons - one of whom, Henry Heath Glover Junior (1828-1904) was also an illustrator and printmaker.
1 portrait in the collection
Just now we pause to mark the centenary of ANZAC, the day when, together with British, other imperial and allied forces, the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps landed at Gallipoli at the start of the ill-starred Dardanelles campaign.
The Reverend Edward Puckle (c. 1800-1898), Anglican clergyman, took holy orders in Exeter and officiated in Cornwall before sailing on the Randolph to Canterbury, NZ in 1850.
1 portrait in the collection
Purchased with funds provided by Graham Smith 2009
Will (William Henry) Dyson, cartoonist, caricaturist, writer and draughtsman, was born in Alfredtown, near Ballarat, and studied for a short time in Melbourne, where he worked closely with his older brother Ambrose.
11 portraits in the collection
Purchased 2019
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Ted and Gina Gregg 2012
Purchased 2009
Purchased 2019
Purchased 2009
Purchased 2012
Purchased 2009
In 2006 the National Portrait Gallery acquired a splendid portrait of Victoria's first governor, Lieutenant Governor Charles Joseph La Trobe by Thomas Woolner.
Commissioned with funds provided by Peter Weiss AO 2018
Robert Oatley's continuing benefaction has helped the National Portrait Gallery acquire works that add another layer to the story of Captain Cook.
Purchased 2009
Donald Cameron (1927-2018), Melbourne-born painter and teacher, attended Scotch College before beginning work as an engraver for the Commonwealth Bank in 1943.
2 portraits in the collection
Sir Thomas Lawrence (1769-1830) was one of the leading portrait painters of the Georgian era.
8 portraits in the collection
Purchased 2009
Dame Helen Blaxland DBE (1907–1989), conservationist and fundraiser, studied at the Julian Ashton School of Art in Sydney.
1 portrait in the collection
Jim Paterson, painter, printmaker and sculptor, was born in Melbourne and completed his diploma in Fine Arts at Prahran Technical College in 1969.
1 portrait in the collection
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2009
Jane Windeyer (1865–1950) was the second eldest daughter of politician and judge Sir William Charles Windeyer (1834–1897) and his wife, Mary (née Bolton, 1837–1912), a leading campaigner for women’s rights.
2 portraits in the collection
Gift of Mrs Caroline Philippa Parker 2005. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Gift of the Estate of Nicolaas van der Waarden 2013
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of The Hammond Care Group 1999
Purchased with funds provided by Marilyn Darling AC and the Sid and Fiona Myer Family Foundation 2021
Gift of the artist 2000
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.
Barry Sullivan (1821-1891), English actor, performed on the Melbourne stage between 1862 and 1866.
1 portrait in the collection
'I have just been to my dressing case to take a peep at you.
These paintings by Juan Ford and sculptures by Sam Jinks evoke the impermanence of human life.
Klaus Friedeberger (1922-2019) fled Germany for England at the age of sixteen, and the next year found himself on the Dunera bound for internment in Australia.
3 portraits in the collection
Purchased with funds provided by Wayne Williams 2015
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of John Hamilton 1999
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program
Richard Windeyer (1806-1847), journalist, barrister and politician, was the eldest of the ten children born to Charles Windeyer and his wife Ann Mary and remained in England when the rest of his family went to New South Wales.
3 portraits in the collection
Gift of John Fairfax Holdings Ltd 2002. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Purchased 2010
Gift of J.B. Windeyer 2018
Purchased with funds provided by Robert Oatley AO 2007
Robert Quayle Kermode (1812-1870), politician, was born on the Isle of Man and educated at Castletown.
1 portrait in the collection
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased with funds provided by the Liangis family 2018
Gift of an anonymous donor 2014
Richard Rouse (1774-1852), grazier and landowner, came to New South Wales in 1801 as a free settler with his wife Elizabeth (née Adams, 1772-1849) and the first two of their nine children.
1 portrait in the collection
Basil Hetzel AC (1922-2017), medical scientist, came to South Australia as a three year old and was educated - like Nobel Prize winners William Lawrence Bragg, Howard Florey and Robin Warren - at St Peter's College and the University of Adelaide.
1 portrait in the collection
Charles Abraham, son of a London architect, trained at the Royal Academy schools under the sculptor Sierier, and for a further three years in Paris and Rome.
1 portrait in the collection
When did notions of very fine and very like become separate qualities of a portrait? And what happens to 'very like' in the age of photographic portraiture?
Elizabeth Rouse (née Adams, 1772–1849), colonial spouse, arrived in New South Wales as a free settler in 1801 with her husband, Richard Rouse (1774–1852) and their first two children, one of whom had been born on the voyage out.
1 portrait in the collection
Hon Les Bury CMG (1913-1986), politician, was member for Wentworth in Sydney’s eastern suburbs from 1956 to 1974.
1 portrait in the collection
Edward 'Ned' Trickett (1851- 916), sculler and hotelier, was the best sculler in New South Wales by 1875.
1 portrait in the collection
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2012
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of the Windeyer family 2012
Brian Thorley Loton AC (1929–2022) was chairman of BHP from 1992 to 1997.
2 portraits in the collection
Thomas Brassey, 1st Earl Brassey (1836–1918), politician and governor, studied law and modern history at Oxford, but abandoned law for a career in politics two years after being called to the Bar.
1 portrait in the collection
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of the Windeyer family 2012
Sir Alexander Campbell Onslow (1842-1908), judge, was educated at Cambridge and practised law in England before being appointed attorney general of British Honduras in 1878.
1 portrait in the collection
Purchased 2011
Rt Hon John Adrian Louis Hope KT GCMG GCVO PC, 7th Earl of Hopetoun (1860–1908) was the first governor general of Australia.
3 portraits in the collection
Gift of Richard Elliott 2016. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Richard King 2008
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program
Shirley Hazzard (1931-2016) writer, spent her childhood in Sydney but left with her parents at the age of sixteen for South East Asia and New Zealand.
1 portrait in the collection
Purchased with funds provided by the Sid and Fiona Myer Family Foundation 2021
Frederick Eccleston du Faur (1832–1915), environmentalist, public servant and arts patron, came to Australia from his native London in 1853.
1 portrait in the collection
Purchased 2010
Gift of the artist 2003. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
From infamous bushranger to oyster shop display, curator Jo Gilmour explores the life of George Melville.
Gift of William Bowmore AO OBE 2003. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
James Alipius Goold (1812-1886), first Catholic bishop and archbishop of Melbourne, volunteered for service in New South Wales having studied in Rome and Perugia.
2 portraits in the collection
Bradley & Rulofson was a partnership between photographers Henry W Bradley (1813–1891), a native of North Carolina, and Canadian-born William H Rulofson (1826–1878).
1 portrait in the collection
Ernest Giles (1835-1897), explorer, came to Australia at the age of fifteen, settling in Adelaide.
1 portrait in the collection
This exhibition is the first comprehensive survey of self-portraits in Australia, from the colonial period to the present
Explore the beauty and symbolism of flowers in this weird and wonderful floral extravaganza that showcases more than 50 portraits from the collection, new acquisitions and selected loans.
Commissioned with funds provided by Mrs Diana Ramsay AO 2008
Purchased 2018
Leonard Ian Roach (1925-2003), founding chairman of the Australian Stock Exchange, initiated the amalgamation of six stock exchanges, one in each State capital, into an Australian Stock Exchange in the mid-1980s.
1 portrait in the collection
Seventeen of Australia’s thirty prime ministers to date are represented in the contrasting sizes, moods and mediums of these portraits.
Purchased with funds provided by the Calvert-Jones Foundation, Liangis Family Foundation and the Portrait Dinner Series 2024
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Enid Hawkins 2003
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program
Gift of the Windeyer family 2009. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Gift of Coles Myer Ltd 2002. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Julian Rossi Ashton CBE (1851-1942), art teacher, artist and critic, trained in art in London and at the Académie Julian in Paris before coming to Australia to work on the Illustrated Australian News in 1878.
4 portraits in the collection
Elaine Haxton (1909-1999), painter, graphic artist and theatre designer, grew up in Sydney.
1 portrait in the collection
John Eason (1799–1858) was a shipwright who worked in Van Diemen’s Land during the 1830s, 1840s and 1850s.
1 portrait in the collection
Featuring works by Australian and New Zealand photographers from the late 1970s up to the present day Reveries focuses on images made in the presence of or consciousness of death.
Mary Windeyer (née Bolton, 1837-1912), women's rights campaigner, was one of the nine children of Robert Thorley Bolton, a clergyman who emigrated to New South Wales in 1839.
3 portraits in the collection
Gift of the artist 2001
Nigel Butterley AM (1935-2022) was one of the foremost Australian composers and pianists of his generation.
1 portrait in the collection
The Darling Portrait Prize is a biennial national prize for Australian portrait painting honouring the legacy of Mr L Gordon Darling AC CMG.
Richard Tognetti AO (b. 1965), violinist, conductor and composer, trained with William Primrose in Wollongong and Alice Waten in Sydney before undertaking further studies with Igor Ozim in Switzerland.
2 portraits in the collection
Peter Wegner first participated in a group exhibition in 1977, when he had had no art training.
7 portraits in the collection
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased with funds provided by L Gordon Darling AC CMG 2009
Gift of BHP Billiton 2003. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
An exploration of the role of artists such as John Webber who, whilst a member of Cook’s crew over many voyages, created paintings and drawings of the situations and people the explorers encountered.
Henry Searle (1886–1889), a sculler known as the ‘Clarence River Comet’, took up rowing as a boy as a means of getting himself and his siblings to and from school.
1 portrait in the collection
Gift of Danina Dupain Anderson 2017. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
Purchased 2015
This exhibition offers a comprehensive display of Clifton Pugh's portraits revealing his development and growth from tonal paintings to a unique style that was in demand from politicians, artists, academics and Australian personalities.
Commissioned with funds provided by Angela Nevill, Nevill Keating Pictures Ltd, in memory of William Keating 2001
Nicholas Harding: 28 portraits features paintings of Robert Drewe, John Bell and Hugo Weaving alongside gorgeously coloured recent oil portraits, delicate gouaches and bold ink and charcoal drawings.
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2011
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.
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2011
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.
More than eighty treasures from the National Portrait Gallery London will travel to Canberra for a once-in-a-lifetime exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery from March 2022.
Kristin Headlam's portrait of Chris Wallace-Crabbe was acquired with the support of the Circle of Friends in 2014.
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of the Australian Securities Exchange 2012
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program
Carol Jerrems (1949–1980) was a photographer known for her intimate portraits of friends, lovers and others occupying the progressive social and creative circles in which she moved.
8 portraits in the collection
Charles Robert Wynn-Carrington (1843–1928), 1st Marquess of Lincolnshire, landowner and Liberal politician, was governor of New South Wales in the late 1880s.
2 portraits in the collection
Sir Edward Eyre Williams (1813–1880), judge and barrister, arrived in Port Phillip in 1842 having been admitted to the Bar in London nine years earlier.
1 portrait in the collection
Miriam Hyde AO OBE (1913-2005), composer, recitalist, teacher, examiner, poet, lecturer and writer of numerous articles for music journals, studied first with her mother and then with William Silver at the Elder Conservatorium in Adelaide.
1 portrait in the collection
Peter Booth (b. 1940) grew up in the English steel mill town of Sheffield, bike-riding on the nearby moors.
1 portrait in the collection
Hardtmuth Lahm (1912-1981), commercial artist and cartoonist, came to Australia from Estonia as a sixteen-year-old.
1 portrait in the collection
Clifton Pugh AO was one of Australia’s best-known artists of the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s, and one of its leading advocates for the arts.
12 portraits in the collection
Nancy Menetrey (née Wilkinson) (1924-2024) was born in Sydney in 1924.
1 portrait in the collection
Masters of fare: chefs, winemakers, providores celebrates men and women who have championed the unique culinary characteristics and produce of Australia, enriching our lives with new ideas and new flavours over the past forty years.
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of the Estate of Stuart Campbell 2012
Janet Dawson (b. 1935), painter, printer, teacher and stage designer, is known for her contribution to abstract art in Australia.
10 portraits in the collection
Jean Appleton (1911–2003), painter and art teacher, studied at the East Sydney Technical College, completing a diploma in drawing and illustration in 1932.
5 portraits in the collection
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2018
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.
Alexander McLeay (aka Macleay) (1767-1848), public servant and entomologist, acquired an interest in insects while working as a clerk in London.
1 portrait in the collection
Sarah Hill introduces the portrait busts of Sir Charles Kingsford Smith and Captain Charles Ulm by Enid Fleming.
Vanity Fair Portraits traces the birth and evolution of photographic portraiture through the archives of Vanity Fair magazine.
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2001
Sir Douglas Frank Hewson Packer KBE (1906-1974), media proprietor, grew up in Sydney and became a cadet journalist on the Daily Guardian, owned by his father RC Packer, in 1923.
2 portraits in the collection
Michelle Garnaut AO studied at Monash University before travelling widely in the early 1980s, returning to Melbourne to complete catering qualifications at William Angliss College.
1 portrait in the collection
The artist's diary profiles six decades of Cassab's work, from the early portrait commissions of the 1950s to later paintings that have helped confirm her eminent place in the canon of Australian portraiture.
George William Perry (1824–1900) was born in London and arrived in Victoria via South Africa around 1852.
2 portraits in the collection
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2005
Christopher Chapman delights in the intimacy of Robert Mapplethorpe's photography
The Australian cricket team of 1882 was the third side to tour England and the team whose defeat of England at The Oval in August of that year initiated the 'The Ashes' Test series.
1 portrait in the collection
The considered matching of artist to subject has produced an amazing collection of unique and original works in the permanent collection of the National Portrait Gallery
Sir James Dowling (1787-1844), judge, worked as a parliamentary reporter before he was called to the Bar in London in May 1815.
1 portrait in the collection
Jenny Sages (b. 1933), artist, was born to Russian Jewish parents in Shanghai and came to Australia with her family in 1948.
34 portraits in the collection
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.
Friedrich Wilhelm Ludwig Leichhardt (1813-c. 1848) went to school and university in Germany but the range of his interests was such that he never actually graduated (he was later called Dr Leichhardt in recognition of his broad scholarship).
1 portrait in the collection
David Hansen’s tribute to his close friend, prince of words and former National Portrait Gallery director, the late Angus Trumble.
Hilary McPhee AO (b. 1941), writer and editor, began her career at Meanjin before starting a small magazine, Theatre.
1 portrait in the collection
Tom Roberts (1856–1931), artist, came to Australia from England at the age of 13, but returned eight years later to study art in London.
9 portraits in the collection
John Russell, 1st Earl Russell KG GCMG PC (1792 –1878) was Secretary of State for War and the Colonies from 1839 to 1841 and served twice as Prime Minister of Great Britain, in 1846-1852 and 1865-1866.
1 portrait in the collection
George Mealmaker (1768–1808), convict and activist, became involved in radical politics in his native Dundee in the 1780s.
1 portrait in the collection
Rachel Roxburgh (1915–1991), artist, conservationist and architectural historian, grew up in Sydney's eastern suburbs and studied art at East Sydney Technical College and the Adelaide Perry Art School in the 1930s.
1 portrait in the collection
The then Minister for the Arts and Sport, Rod Kemp, reflects on the value of the Cultural Gifts Program.
RM (Reginald Murray) Williams AO CBE (1908-2003), saddlery, boot and clothing manufacturer, miner and author, moved to Adelaide from his birthplace near the Flinders Rangers when he was 10.
1 portrait in the collection
Portraits can render honour to remarkable men and women, but there are other ways.
I have been reading systematically through the ads in the earliest issues of the Sydney Gazette and New South Wales Advertiser, such a rich vein of information about certain aspects of daily life in Regency Sydney.
Dr Helen Caldicott (b. 1938), physician, author and activist, was born Helen Broinowski in Melbourne and gained her degree in Medicine from the University of Adelaide in 1961.
1 portrait in the collection
David Mitchell (1829-1916), builder, contractor and businessman, arrived in Melbourne in mid-1852 in the Anna.
1 portrait in the collection
Henry (Harry) Edwards (1827–1891), actor and entomologist, arrived in Melbourne in 1853 after a short-lived attempt at studying for a career in law.
1 portrait in the collection
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2010
Esther Erlich’s portrait of Lady McMahon.
Celebrates the centenary of the first national art collection, the Historic Memorials Collection, housed at Australia's Parliament House.
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of the Estate of Leslie Walford AM 2013
John Dunn (1802-1894), flour miller and philanthropist, eked out a mean living as a mill manager in England before migrating to South Australia with his wife and son in 1840.
1 portrait in the collection
Thomas Griffiths Wainewright (1794-1847) is one of the most intriguing and talented figures in colonial Australian art.
4 portraits in the collection
David Unaipon (1872-1967) writer, public speaker and inventor, was a Ngarrindjeri man, fourth of nine children of the evangelist James Ngunaitponi and his wife Nymbulda, both of whom were Yaraldi speakers.
1 portrait in the collection
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of John McPhee 2018
Purchased with funds provided by the Ian Potter Foundation 2008
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased with funds provided by L Gordon Darling AC CMG and Marilyn Darling AC 2013
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2010
Purchased with funds provided by Ross A Field 2007
It is not every day that a national gallery turns its walls over to the animal companions that bring unconditional love and joy to their owners but this summer we have opened the doors to 15 contemporary artists with very different ways of depicting our furry, feathered and scaled pets.
Joanna Gilmour on Tom Durkin playing with Melbourne's manhood.
Christian Waller (née Yandell, 1894–1954), printmaker, muralist and stained-glass artist, was born in Castlemaine, Victoria and commenced studying art at the Castlemaine School of Mines in 1905.
1 portrait in the collection
James McCabe provides proof that hanging wasn’t necessarily a fate reserved for the perpetrators of murder and other deeds of darkest hue.
Joanna Gilmour delves into a collection display that celebrates the immediacy and potency of drawing as an art form in its own right.
Bushranger Ben Hall and his cronies held around 40 people hostage in a pub north-west of Goulburn, telling their captives ‘don’t be alarmed; we only came here for a bit of fun’.
Purchased 2010
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.
Edward Hammond Hargraves (1816–1891), adventurer and speculator, claimed credit for the discovery of payable goldfields in New South Wales.
1 portrait in the collection
George Billett (also Bellett, Bellette and Billet, 1812–1885) was a farmer and landowner, an early settler of Sorell in Tasmania, and the son of two ex-convicts.
1 portrait in the collection
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased with funds provided by Graham Smith 2009
Members of the Board, Foundation and staff of the National Portrait Gallery are deeply saddened by the sudden passing of Angus Trumble.
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2010
Thomas Woolner, sculptor, studied first with the brothers Henry and William Behnes, painter and sculptor respectively, and later at the Royal Academy, at which he was to become professor of sculpture in his fifties.
5 portraits in the collection
Michael Desmond examines the career of the eighteenth-century suspected poisoner and portrait artist Thomas Griffiths Wainewright.
Henry Baynton Somer ‘Jo’ Gullett AM MC (1914-1999), soldier, politician, ambassador, farmer and author, was the son of Sir Henry Gullett, who was one of the Australian official historians of the First World War.
1 portrait in the collection
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of Lady Bunting in honour of Sir John Bunting and the Menzies Foundation 1999
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program
This article examines the portraits gifted to the National Portrait Gallery by Fairfax Holdings in 2003.
Former NPG Director, Andrew Sayers celebrates the support given to the Gallery by Gordon and Marilyn Darling.
In 2020 the Annual Appeal was focussed on Sally Robinson's remarkable portrait of author Tim Winton.
George Billett (also Bellett, Bellette and Billet, 1812–1885) was a farmer and landowner, an early settler of Sorell in Tasmania, and the son of two ex-convicts.
1 portrait in the collection
Grace Carroll discusses the portrait of the late-eighteenth century gentleman pickpocket George Barrington.
Tim Storrier describes the influences on the development of his artistic style.
The long life and few words of a vice-regal cockatoo
Commissioned with funds provided by Peter Weiss AO 2018
Percy Leason, artist, illustrator and cartoonist, grew up in Victoria's Wimmera region and trained in the rudiments of art in Nhill.
1 portrait in the collection
Faith Stellmaker shares pioneering artist and restaurateur Mirka Mora’s lasting legacy on Melbourne’s art, dining and culture.
Purchased 2010
Edward Riou (1762-1801), naval officer, began his career with the Royal Navy at the age of twelve.
2 portraits in the collection
Pat Corrigan's generous gift of 100 photographic portraits by Greg Weight.
Mary Anne Egan (also Marianne or Marian, née Cheers, 1818–1857), was born in Sydney, the daughter of ex-convicts.
1 portrait in the collection
Isabella Louisa Parry (née Stanley, 1801–1839), amateur artist, community worker and collector, was the daughter of Sir John Stanley, first Baron Stanley of Alderley, a Whig politician and member of the Royal Society.
1 portrait in the collection
Just after 10.00 o'clock on 3 December 1879, four prisoners were brought from their cells at Darlinghurst Gaol and placed in the dock of a courtroom heaving with agitated spectators
Commissioned with funds provided by Ross Adler AC 2018
Inga Walton sheds light on a portraiture collection usually only seen by students and teachers at Melbourne University.
Michael Desmond discusses Fred Williams' portraits of friends, artist Clifton Pugh, David Aspden and writer Stephen Murray-Smith, and the stylistic connections between his portraits and landscapes.
The photograph was a brief, candid moment, which unfolded into a portrait. Peter and I were in Silverton, NSW, chatting as our students explored the town. The weak afternoon light suddenly became dramatic and defined, so I asked Peter if I could take his portrait.
Jessica Smith looks at the 'fetching' portrait of Tasmania's first Anglican Bishop, Francis Russell Nixon by George Richmond
Richard Flanagan (b. 1961) was born in Longford in northern Tasmania, the second youngest of the six children of Archie Flanagan, a primary school principal, and his wife Helen.
1 portrait in the collection
Anne Sanders writes about the exhibitions Victoria & Albert: Art & Love on display at the Queen's Gallery, Buckingham Palace and the retrospective of Sir Thomas Lawrence at the National Portrait Gallery, London.
Penelope Grist explores the interplay between medicine and portraiture in Vic McEwan’s Face to Face: The New Normal.
Susi Muddiman delights in Michael Zavros’ stunning portrait of the honourable Dame Quentin Bryce AD CVO.
In the exhibition William Kentridge: Drawn from Africa at the National Gallery of Australia, the artist marries Gogol's Tsarist Russia, with that of Stalin and the damaging history of his homeland, South Africa.
Joanna Gilmour explores the life and art of the Australian artist Janet Dawson.
Joanna Gilmour presents John Kay’s portraits of a more infamous side of Edinburgh.
Select extracts from Mirka Mora's autobiography, Wicked but Virtuous, provide rich accompaniment to recent Gallery acquisitions.
A new painting by Jiawei Shen captures the vision and resolve of the Gallery's founder, L. Gordon Darling AC CMG.
Take a peek at a selection of the portraits you can see in the exhibition.
One of the chief aims of George Stubbs, 1724–1806, the late Judy Egerton’s great 1984–85 exhibition at the Tate Gallery was to provide an eloquent rebuttal to Josiah Wedgwood’s famous remark of 1780: “Noboby suspects Mr Stubs [sic] of painting anything but horses & lions, or dogs & tigers.”
Henry Mundy's portraits flesh out notions of propriety and good taste in a convict colony.
Joanna Gilmour explores the life and times of convict-turned-artist William Buelow Gould.
Long after the portraitist became indifferent to her, and died, a beguiling portrait hung over its subject.
The story behind George Lambert's Self-portrait with Gladioli.
Directors of the National Portrait Gallery from 1998 to today.
Angus Trumble salutes the glorious portraiture of Sir Thomas Lawrence.
Christopher Chapman highlights the inaugural hang of the new National Portrait Gallery building which opened in December 2008.
Traversing paint and pixels, Inga Walton examines portraits of select women in Tudors to Windsors: British Royal Portraits.
Dr Sarah Engledow tells the story of The Queen’s Diamond Jubilee portrait by Australian artist Ralph Heimans.
Joanna Gilmour explores the life and times of one of Melbourne's early socialites, Jessie Eyre Williams.
Sarah Engledow pens a fond farewell to acclaimed science historian Ann Moyal.
Sarah Engledow on a foundational gallery figure who was quick on the draw.
Whether the result of misadventure or misdemeanour, many accomplished artists were transported to Australia where they ultimately left a positive mark on the history of art in this country.
Alison Baily Rehfisch (1900–1975) was born Alison Green in Woollahra, New South Wales, to parents who 'were very interested in painting – in all the arts: music, literature, everything'.
2 portraits in the collection
Christopher Chapman immerses himself in Larry Clark’s field of vision.
Joanna Gilmore delights in the affecting drawings of Mathew Lynn.
Tamsin Hong recounts the tale of Marion Smith, the only known Australian Indigenous servicewoman of World War One.
Matthew Jones on the upshot of a St Kilda Road outrage.
A focus on Indigenous-European relationships underpins Facing New Worlds. By Kate Fullagar.
A remarkable undated drawing by Edward Lear (1812–88) blends natural history and whimsy.
Former NPG Director, Andrew Sayers describes the 1922 Self-portrait with Gladioli by George Lambert.
John Zubrzycki meets Australian paint pioneer Jim Cobb.
Andrew Sayers outlines the highlights of the National Portrait Gallery's display of portrait sculpture.
Jane Raffan investigates auction sales of self portraits nationally and internationally.
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.
The Australian public was invited in 2008 to vote for their favourite Australian. After the votes were tallied an exhibition of the top-ten Popular Australians and the top-twenty unsung heroes was displayed at the National Portrait Gallery.
Joanna Gilmour discusses the role of the carte de visite in portraiture’s democratisation, and its harnessing by Victoria, the world’s first media monarch.
Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Purchased 2018
In March 2003 Magda Keaney travelled to London to join the photography section of the Victoria & Albert Museum for three months.
In recent years I have become fascinated by the so-called Sydney Cove Medallion (1789), a work of art that bridges the 10,000-mile gap between the newly established penal settlement at Port Jackson and the beating heart of Enlightenment England.
Fiona Gruber investigates the work of Australian painter Kristin Headlam.
Diana O’Neil samples the tartan treats on offer in the Scottish National Portrait Gallery.
Sarah Engledow bristles at the biographers’ neglect of Kitchener’s antipodean intervention.
Former National Portrait Gallery Curator Magda Keaney was a member of the selection panel of the Schwepes Photographic Portrait Prize 2004 at the National Portrait Gallery London.
Michael Desmond explores the complex portrait of Dr Bob Brown by Harold 'The Kangaroo' Thornton.
Barbara Blackman reflects on her experiences as a life model.
The Rajah Quilt’s narrative promptings are as intriguing as the textile is intricate.
Sarah Engledow lauds the very civil service of Dame Helen Blaxland.
Archie 100 curator (and detective) Natalie Wilson’s nationwide search for Archibald portraits unearthed the fascinating stories behind some long-lost treasures.
Where do we draw a line between the personal and the historical? Although she died in Melbourne in 1975, when I was not quite eleven years old, I have the vividest memories of my maternal grandmother Helen Borthwick.
The portrait of Dr. Johann Reinhold Forster and his son George Forster from 1780, is one of the oldest in the NPG's collection.
Robert Hannaford has completed around 400 portraits over the span of his career.
A collection of thirty-seven caricatures by the artist Joe Greenberg capture the heroes and villians of Australian business in the 1980s.
Representations of the inhabitants of the new world expose the complexities of the colonisers' intentions.
An exhibition devoted to Hans Holbein's English commissions shows the portraitist bringing across the Channel new technical developments in art - with a dazzling facility.
The tragic tale of Tom Wills, the ‘inventor’ of Australian Rules Football.
Cartoonist Michael Leunig's insights into the human condition and current affairs have become famous Australia-wide.
At first glance, this small watercolour group portrait of her two sons and four daughters by Maria Caroline Brownrigg (d. 1880) may seem prosaic, even hesitant
Joanna Gilmour revels in accidental artist Charles Rodius’ nineteenth century renderings of Indigenous peoples.
All that fall: Sacrifice, life and loss in the First World War exhibition co-curators Dr Anne Sanders and Dr Christopher Chapman reflect on the evolution of the Gallery’s Anzac Centenary exhibition.
Aimee Board chats to emerging photographer Charles Dennington.
Joanna Gilmour accounts for Australia’s deliciously ghoulish nineteenth century criminal portraiture.
The exhibition Reveries: Photography and mortality is a powerful display which brings together images that depict the last phase of people's lives.
The name of Florence Broadhurst, one of Australia’s most significant wallpaper and textile designers, is now firmly cemented in the canon of Australian art and design.
Diana Warnes explores the lives of Hal and Katherine 'Kate' Hattam through their portraits painted by Fred Williams and Clifton Pugh.
How the National Portrait Gallery and its unique collection came to be
Michael Desmond, National Photographic Portrait Prize judge and curator, introduces the 2007 Prize.
Inga Walton delves into the bohemian group of artists and writers who used each other as muses and transformed British culture.
Michael Desmond profiles a handful of the entrants in first National Photographic Portrait Prize and notes emerging themes and categories.
Sarah Engledow explores the history of the prime ministers and artists featured in the exhibition.
Phil Manning celebrates a century of Brisbane photographic portraiture.
The art of Australia’s colonial women painters affords us an invaluable, alternative perspective on the nascent nation-building project.
The story behind two colonial portraits; a lithograph of captain and convict John Knatchbull and newspaper illustration of Robert Lowe, Viscount Sherbrooke.
Corinna Cullen on the symbolic power of pandemic-related imagery over the ages.
Joanna Gilmour looks beyond the ivory face of select portrait miniatures to reveal their sitters’ true grit.
Dr. Sarah Engledow discovers the amazing life of Ms. Hilda Spong, little remembered star of the stage, who was captured in a portrait by Tom Roberts.
Ashleigh Wadman rediscovers the Australian characters represented with a kindly touch by the British portrait artist Leslie Ward for the society magazine Vanity Fair.
Charles Haddon Chambers the Australian-born playboy playwright settled permanently in London in 1880 but never lost his Australian stance when satirising the English.
John Singer Sargent: a painter at the vanguard of contemporary movements in music, literature and theatre.
2019 National Photographic Portrait Prize judge Anne O’Hehir looks beneath the surface of this year’s entries.
Sarah Engledow likes the manifold mediums of Nicholas Harding’s portraiture.
Joanna Gilmour examines the prolific output of Charles Balthazar Julien Févret de Saint-Mémin, and discovers the risk of taking a portrait at face value.
Beyond the centenary of the ANZAC landings at Gallipoli, a number of other notable anniversaries converge this year. Waterloo deserves a little focussed consideration, for in the decades following 1815 numerous Waterloo and Peninsular War veterans came to Australia.
Joanna Gilmour describes how artist Sam Leach works on a small scale to grand effect.
Marian Anderson’s glorious voice thrust her into stardom, and a more reluctant role as American civil rights pioneer.
At just 7.8 x 6.2 cm, the daguerreotype of Thomas Sutcliffe Mort and his wife Theresa is one of the smallest works in the collection of the National Portrait Gallery.
Michael Desmond explores what makes a portrait subject significant.
Joanna Gilmour explores the life of a colonial portrait artist, writer and rogue Thomas Griffiths Wainewright.
Grace Carroll contemplates the curious case of Christian Waller.
An exploration of national identity in the Canadian context drawn from the symposium Face to Face at the Scottish National Portrait Gallery in 2004.
Inga Walton traces the poignant path of photographer Polixeni Papapetrou, revealed in the NGV’s summer retrospective.
Penelope Grist finds inspiration in pioneering New Zealand artist, Frances Hodgkins.
David Gist steps beyond the public relations veneer of Australia’s official Vietnam War portrait photographs.
Joanna Gilmour travels through time to explore the National Portrait Gallery London’s masterpieces in Shakespeare to Winehouse.
Karen Vickery on Chang the Chinese giant in Australia.
Joanna Gilmour reflects on 25 years of collecting at the National Portrait Gallery.
Christopher Chapman takes a trip through the doors of perception, arriving at the junction of surrealism and psychoanalysis.
This is my last Trumbology before, in a little more than a week from now, I pass to my successor Karen Quinlan the precious baton of the Directorship of the National Portrait Gallery.
Sandra Bruce gazes on love and the portrait through Australian Love Stories’ multi-faceted prism.
Sharon Peoples contemplates costumes and the construction of identity.
Jean Appleton’s 1965 self portrait makes a fine addition to the National Portrait Gallery’s collection writes Joanna Gilmour.
Karl James gives short shrift to doubts about the profile of General Sir John Monash.
Sarah Engledow previews the beguiling summer exhibition, Idle hours.
Celebrating a new painted portrait of Joseph Banks, Sarah Engledow spins a yarn of the naturalist, the first kangaroo in France and Don, a Spanish ram.
Basil grew into a speckled beauty – a long-legged leaper and an exceptionally vocal dog, with a great register of sounds, ascending in shock value from a whimper to a growl to a bark to a yelp that’s a violation of the ears.
Alexandra Roginski gets a feel for phrenology’s fundamentals.
To accompany the exhibition Cecil Beaton: Portraits, held at the NPG in 2005, this article is drawn from Hugo Vickers's authorised biography, Cecil Beaton (1985).
Joanna Gilmour describes how colonial portraitists found the perfect market among social status seeking Sydneysiders.
Aircraft designer, pilot and entrepreneur, Sir Lawrence Wackett rejoins friends and colleagues on the walls of the National Portrait Gallery.
Emma Kindred examines fashion as a representation of self and social ritual in 19th-century portraiture.
Sarah Engledow writes about Gordon and Marilyn Darling and their support for the National Portrait Gallery throughout its evolution.
Some years ago my colleague Andrea Wolk Rager and I spent several days in the darkened basement of a Rothschild Bank, inspecting every one of the nearly 700 autochromes created immediately before World War I by the youthful Lionel de Rothschild.
Vanity Fair Editor David Friend describes how the rebirth of the magazine sated our desire for access into the lives of celebrities and set the standard for the new era of portrait photography.
Traudi Allen discovers sensitivity, humour and fine draughtsmanship in the portraiture of John Perceval.
Dr Anne Sanders NPG Curatorial Researcher investigated the lives of the pioneering psychologists whose portraits are featured in Inner Worlds.
Penny Grist, National Photographic Portrait Prize judge and curator, introduces the 2016 Prize.
An exhibition of humanness in ten themes by Penelope Grist.
Judith Pugh reflects on Clifton Pugh's approach to portrait making.
How seven portraits within Bare reveal in a public portrait parts of the body and elements of life usually located in the private sphere.
Dempsey’s People curator David Hansen chronicles a research tale replete with serendipity, adventure and Tasmanian tigers.
Anne Sanders celebrates the cinematic union of two pioneering australian women.
Angus Trumble reflects on the force of nature that was Helena Rubinstein.
Dr Sarah Engledow explores the portraits of writers held in the National Portrait Gallery's collection.
Joanna Gilmour reflects on merging collections and challenging traditional assumptions around portraiture in WHO ARE YOU.
Sarah Engledow looks at three decades of Nicholas Harding's portraiture.
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.
Dr Christopher Chapman NPG Curator of Inner Worlds explains the development of an exhibition that spans from Surrealism to contemporary art.
Sarah Engledow chronicles Rick Amor's work and accomplishments in this extensive essay in conjunction with the exhibition Rick Amor: 21 Portraits.