Shea Kirk has won the 2023 National Photographic Portrait Prize (NPPP) with his work titled Ruby (left view); the portrait of Emma Armstrong-Porter (she/they) is half of a stereoscopic pair from Kirk’s ongoing series Vantages. Kirk takes home $30,000 cash from the National Portrait Gallery and $20,000 worth of Canon camera equipment.
2023 NPPP Judges – National Portrait Gallery Senior Curator Joanna Gilmour, Daniel Boetker-Smith, Director of the Centre for Contemporary Photography, and critically acclaimed photo media artist Tamara Dean, said the work was a “celebration of photography.” They add:
“While Shea makes the portrait look effortless, this is a masterful and technically complex work where the sitter has no self-consciousness. It is as if the artist and sitter are participating equally in the transaction.”

Shea Kirk, Ruby (left view), 2022
Renae Saxby was awarded the Highly Commended prize, for her work Bangardidjan, 2022, an image of proud Kine, Rembarrnga, and Dalabon women Cindy Rostron on the road in remote Central Arnhem Land. Rostron is photographed in the family car with a buffalo skull painted by her father, Victor Rostron, strapped to the roof. The judges said the work had:
“exceptional cinematic quality, encapsulating an entire story, and while there is so much to see from a narrative point of view, it is the sitters gaze which draws you in.”

Renae Saxby, Bangardidjan, 2022
An exhibition of finalists’ works is on view at the National Portrait Gallery in Canberra from 17 June to 2 October 2023.