Congratulations to Nicole Kelly who has been selected as a finalist in the Portia Geach Memorial Award 2025 for her incredible portrait of Arthouse Gallery Director Ali Yeldham.
A visceral and intimate portrait, Kelly has depicted Ali in her home surrounded by art, vibrant fabrics with visual motifs that connect artist and subject into one of creative and artistic exchange.
Kelly creates paintings that linger between the essence of a subject and the experience of being. Clouded by the romanticism of remembering, her paintings are imbued with experience captured in vibrant strokes of colour and with swift brushwork. Kelly’s works, informed by an interest in literature and the discipline of painting, cast moments of shared stillness in an atmosphere of light. She says of her works “my desire is to push painting beyond a surface likeness of any subject and into the realm of poetics”.
The Portia Geach Memorial Award is Australia’s most prestigious art prize for portraiture by women artists and will be on display until 2 November 2025. Don’t miss it!
