Taylor Wessing Photographic Portrait Prize 2017.

I always find the period before Christmas goes really fast. I like the buzz and Christmas decorations in London, and I enjoy hearing Christmas songs being being played inside the supermarkets. I always get invited to several Christmas dos, I have already been to two and I have got another Christmas lunch next week.  I particularly enjoyed the last one, being my friend's sports club; they have got a smart dress code in place and I like to dress up for the occasion. People were nice, the dinner was lovely, and to top it all I won two prizes in the raffle. It made it all worthwhile despite it being freezing cold outside, I had been freezing in my sparkly evening dress. I was invited to another Christmas lunch this week by another friend of mine, a vegetarian Christmas lunch, I had a nut roast that was actually really nice, the entire meal was lovely. I did well in the quiz, my friends were laughing because I got all the questions on Hugh Hefner, Chuck Berry & Bond correct while the other people at my table were covering other more high brow topics... I also had a chat with a well known American War correspondent who has written several famous books including one on Iraq. We had an interesting chat about Hemingway. Anyway, since having all these lunches I decided to walk it off and go to the Portrait Gallery to view The Taylor Wessing Photographic Portrait prize 2017. I must say the weather has been dreadful so I was really glad to be indoors again. There has been a controversy for this year's competition due to the fact that the judges accepted and then gave a prize to Maija Tammi who took a photo of an android and by doing so broke the rules of the prize. Many people have questioned this, as the photographers had to pay to participate and the judges, by breaking their own rules, rather undermined the fundamental meaning of the prize. 

Rule 5.3 of the competition states that: All photographs must have been taken by the entrant from life and with a living sitter after January 2016.

Photo courtesy of the National Portrait Gallery

Competitions for prizes are a lucrative business; if you have 5717 people applying and each is paying and then you have to select only a handful of winners. This year was also the first year one could apply by sending the images digitally. It was not specified  what all the images in the Portrait Prize should be printed on. They were extremely well taken, high quality photographs not printed in a normal way as they were high definition.

Overall I would say there was a narrative to each image, more than with regular portrait photography, and the selection of photographs was more in the realm of documentary photography. Each photograph told a story. Of refugees escaping war, with one particular photograph of a young woman  wearing a scarf looking out of a bus, with a lost look. The photograph was taken by Abbie Trayler-Smith, entitled Fleeing Mosul (see pic. above from right), from the series Women in War. This received second prize, the woman is been taken away from a war zone into a refugees camp by Oxfam. Her red scarf matches the bus curtain, the photograph is a close up of her, of her raw emotion. The colours are muted, the close up makes you think of religious paintings like for example the Botticelli's Madonna of the Pomegranate (see pic. below), due to the way it is framed, which gives it a holy feel.

Madonna of the Pomenegrate by Sandro Botticelli courtesy of Pinterest

The first  Prize went to Cesar Dezfuli and his portrait of 16 years old Amadou Sumaila (first pic. see above from left) who has just been rescued from the Libyan coast, part of the migration drama. It's a close up of him, we can see human tragedy stretched across his face, fear, uncertainty but also determination. We can see his thin frame & ribs while in the background  we can see the infinite sea and sky that has killed other refugees who have not been lucky enough to have been rescued. Both photographs show human tragedy, human emotion, unlike the photograph of the android with no expression, titled Erica by Maija Tammi  part of the Series One of Them Is a Human (see pic. above, centre), who won third prize. The android looks soulless, is in fact a photograph of a robot. There is a fake alluring serenity in this photograph, it is glossy and the expression is serene and distant, it shares nothing with the different faces of human tragedy of the refugees. By giving third prize to this photograph it rather suggests that artifical intelligence is more relevant than actual human tragedy. It is a distant and generic photograph, there is no expression in the face of the android. Yes, the photograph questions what it is to be human, it is a provocative view on the evolution of human beings, per se it is an interesting, well taken photograph, it does raise interesting questions but it should not have won a prize as it broke the rules of the competition. The whole point of the Prize was to take a photograph of a human, not of a robot.... 

Photo By Laurent Elie Badessi courtesy of the Guardian

Then there is the photograph taken by Laurent Elie Badessi in black and white of Texan 16 year old George carrying automatic weapons  which I find more relevant; it's a full frontal photo, with George grinning. It is a disturbing photograph as no 16 year old is allowed to carry guns in the UK. His demeanour is depicted as normal -  he is showing off his weapons as if he is carrying groceries and not automatic firearms, while wearing an American Tshirt with the emblem of an an Eagle,  the American symbol of power and freedom. So for him power and for a section of society in America, guns are seen as symbols of power and freedom while we over here associate them with aggression & the military, not as a common thing you would carry in your daily life, and certainly not as a 16 year old. But I have to say a lot of 16 year olds in London do carry knives, and there is a big problem with knife culture,  and the proliferation of different gangs. I also found the photograph of President Trump exiting a room (see pic. below) telling of his petulant, impatient personality. 

Photo By Benjamin Rasmussen courtesy of the Daily Mail

The photo was taken by Benjamin Rasmussen  who photographed Trump for Time Magazine. Apparently he only had 30 seconds to take a picture of Trump, and this is one of only two shots he managed to get.  We can only see his hair and his grumpy expression reflected on the door,  as he walks away.

Photo by Alan Mozes courtsey of Vanity Fair

There is also a close up of Barack Obama with a child pinching his nose (pic. below, taken by Alan Mozes)! This shows Obama in a friendly, funny way. There is another photograph of Hillary Clinton, by Alan Mozes, looking excited (see pic. below); this particular photograph of her was used by some parts of the media to suggest  that she was unstable and unreliable rather than energetic and purposeful. Each portrait photograph in its on way shows a different side of the USA. Much more interesting than a picture of a soulless robot.

Photo by Alan Mozes Courtesy of Vanity Fair

If I had to choose I would have liked to give the third prize not to the photo of the Android but to Anna Boyazis and her photo titled Burkini Island, see pic below. To me this photograph shows what difficulties women still face in some parts of the world to carry out a basic activity. It is a photograph of girls from the Kijini Primary school wearing burkini swimsuits and for doing so they have been allowed to learn to float in the water and perform rescue operations in the Indian ocean, in an area where life is dependent on the sea.

Photo by Anna Boyazis courtesy of Photoint.net

Each photograph is framed and accompanied with a description which adds to the understanding of the photograph. Excellent exhibition.