Rod McNicol Robert Hunter 1984 & 2004
Rod McNicol has won the inaugural Citigroup Private Bank Australian Photographic Portrait Prize for his portrait, Robert Hunter 1984 & 2004. Rod Hunter receives a prize of $15,000.
Rod McNicol has known his subject, the artist Robert Hunter, for a long while - even before that first portrait was taken in front of his studio wall in 1984. When asked to pose again 20 years later, 'he was into it - and it is a fairly demanding ask of anyone,' says McNicol.
It is the same studio wall, but how fascinating and subtle are the changes time has wrought in Hunter's face. McNicol has decided this twin portrait will be the forerunner of a series in which he revisits portrait photographs he took in the early part of his career.
Portraits have always been a strong strand in his work. Born in Melbourne in 1946, he studied photography at Prahran College. In 1988 he won the St Kilda Arts Festival Prize and was awarded an Australia Council grant. He has also participated as an artist-in-residence in the Oncology Ward of Melbourne's Repatriation General Hospital. Of the past decade he says he 'just disappeared' as he followed a different passion - horses and the art of dressage. 'But you can't have two major obsessions that don't pay very much money,' he says. So the dressage is in his past and he is back developing several photographic projects.
With many impressive credits to his name, McNicol's work is included in the collections of the Art Gallery of New South Wales, the National Gallery of Victoria, National Gallery of Australia, National Library of Australia and the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris. He has exhibited widely with exhibitions shown from Melbourne to Cracow and Paris.
THE ARCHIBALD, WYNNE, SULMAN PRIZES
AND THE CITIGROUP PRIVATE BANK AUSTRALIAN PHOTOGRAPHIC PORTRAIT PRIZE
Saturday 27 March to Sunday 16 May
Art Gallery of New South Wales
Art Gallery Road, The Domain, Sydney 2000
Telephone (02) 9225 1744 or national tollfree 1800 679 278
MEDIA INFORMATION
Jan Batten
Telephone (02) 9225 1791 or 0418 279 348
Email janb@ag.nsw.gov.au |
