Portrait Artist of the Year | S03 E02 | All Documentary

This week, the contestants paint celebrity sitters Sue Perkins, Richard E Grant and Nina Sosanya. But who will the judges send through to the next round?

Portrait Artist of the Year is a competition art show aiming to find the best portrait painter of the year.
Each episode features a regional competition and contestants are challenged to produce a portrait of one of three famous sitters.
As the competition goes on, three artists will remain, and these finalists will have their work displayed in the world-famous National Portrait Gallery in London. The winner eventually receives a $10,000 commission to become a permanent part of the British Library!

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[andreaandrea]

Bill Bone DON'T STOP WITH THE POINTILLISM!!!! It's wonderful and no one else does it. And the wax!!! I LOVE how original your work is. Please keep going and bring us more!

[plumpudding]

Props to the winner for being the only one not using technology! I understand how when most people are using it, you'd want to too, especially for the static lighting and when your sitter is moving (and she had the ADHD sitter!) BUT I wish they wouldn't allow technology in the competition (except for the commission at the end). It would be so much more interesting and make full use of the live models.

[dallasnicholson]

I tire sometimes of the use of photos and gridding. There’s a live model, and I would be more entranced if the artists would make more use of them. I am a painter and I understand that gridding and photos serve a purpose, (even very traditional artists used them), but as someone who doesn’t have the luxury of a live model, I feel it would be more competitive and interesting if this were more limited in the competition.

[betty-annbryce]

I guess I am in the minority.. I did not like the one chosen I found it interesting that she was one of the few interacting with a very lively, energetic model with a lot of personality and none of that is reflected in the final work.

[azmgbbb]

I would’ve loved to have painted that beautiful man. None of them took advantage of actually looking at him for four hours

[PaddyPawsRescue]

I think their self portraits have the best likenesses I’ve seen so far.

[nostalgic]

Unpopular opinion: working from photo reference should be banned. What's the point of having a sitter if you're not even looking at them. Basically you're just doing a copy of a photo. The portraits are great. But I think it would add to the challenge, the results will be a lot more interesting and the winner would be someone who really deserves to be the winner.

[darcyswanson]

wonderful episode. The first i have seen. Wonderful fun artists.

[stonew]

As a purist I think it's alright to work off of photos, but overlaying them with grids and drawing off of grids seems like cheating to me. You should be able to eyeball it when composing, in my view....

[brigidine]

Glad she won. Liked her work best of the three and she had to contend with a really challenging sitter! I thought the sitter was both disrespectful of the contestants and very tiresome.

[aaaaaaaaaaaaaaa]

I wish they had a US version because I'd love to participate in this so much T-T

[jeffreyday]

A painting made from a photo is a different species than a painting made from life.

[christinefox]

She's the only one who didn't take a photo and I like that. Very personal artist 🎨 👌

[jenniferpeters]

What is the lovely music tune at minute 27 ish?

[kathmorgan]

It's kind of weird how many famous faces they got to sit for paintings, then the prize is to paint just Graham Norton?

[panchoverde]

I'm an artist. These people are exceptionally talented and skilled.

[colinwhitfield]

When P.Ao.t.Y meets Richard E. Grant, I am in my own personal Nirvana.

[sabrinaevans]

I love the pointillism painter the best

[nanettemorton]

Thanks for uploading! I always wonder if Sue Perkins has ADHD

[robbied]

Frank is right. Sue looked like a fussy local politician. She chatted with her for four hours and got no personality on the canvas at all.