The National Portrait Gallery has announced Hoda Afshar as the winner of the National Photographic Portrait Prize for the work Untitled #01 (from the series code Black/Riot) 2024. This is the second time that Afshar has been awarded the Prize.
Now in its 18th year, the National Photographic Portrait Prize supports and celebrates photographic portraiture in Australia. Open to established and emerging artists, the prize is an opportunity for artists to have their work shown in a national gallery alongside their peers.
Afshar’s Untitled #01 (from the series Code Black/Riot) 2024, is part of a collaboration with a group of First Nations young people in far north Queensland that questions a system that targets and imprisons them from the age of 10.
The project, facilitated by the Cairns based Youth Empowered Towards Independence and Change the Record in Sydney, invited participants to have their portraits taken, using a means of their own choosing to conceal their identities while making a personal statement. “Some of them chose flowers or bubbles. Others a flag, mask or face paint. The three girls here chose this gesture,” said Afshar.
Judges – writer and broadcaster Benjamin Law, Senior Curator at the National Portrait Gallery Serena Bentley, and Leigh Robb, Curator of Contemporary Art at the Art Gallery of South Australia – said “this is a portrait of immense power, which creates an urgent conversation between viewer and subjects.”
“By handing agency over to her subjects, Hoda Afshar has given these First Nations young people the rare opportunity to frame themselves on their own terms. As part of a group that are often discussed and depicted but rarely given a voice, these figures observe us in turn, giving an assessment of the nation right now.”
“While seemingly incidental, the relationship between the haphazard staging, blurred background and focus points in the foreground make for a bracing, brilliant photograph taken by an artist who truly knows her craft.”
Hoda Afshar is a Naarm/Melbourne-based visual artist and documentary maker, currently working in Berlin. This is the second time she has won the National Photographic Portrait Prize, the first in 2015 with the work, Portrait of Ali, 2014. She wins $30,000 cash courtesy of the Gallery and $20,000 worth of equipment courtesy of Imaging Partner Canon Australia.
Hoda Afshar said she couldn’t hold back tears upon hearing of her win. “I had not intended to enter the prize again – and I certainly never expected to win it. I submitted this work, hoping it might be selected as one of the finalists, in order to draw public attention to the ongoing crisis facing Indigenous children in youth detention across Australia,” she said.
“As a photographer, I am always seeking to disrupt such ways of seeing, and this is why I chose to submit this portrait. For me, these girls’ gesture symbolises an act of resistance both against authority and towards the camera – a refusal to be, or to be seen, as passive,” said Afshar.
Sherry Quiambao is the inaugural winner of the First Time Finalist Award, with the work, Mother dreams on a stone, 2024. Quiambao is an Australian-Filipino multidisciplinary artist based in Boorloo/Perth, Western Australia. Dreams on a stone, 2024 is a glittering portrait of her mother that explores themes of renewal, identity and belonging.
“Wrapped in a golden emergency blanket and resting on a tumbled stone, my mother represents strength and adaptability, finding hope through her migration story. The golden blanket, a symbol of safety and care, contrasts with the grounding presence of the stone. Together, they reflect the tension between aspiration, humility, fragility and resilience,” said Quiambao.
The First Time Finalist Award replaces the Highly Commended Prize, and Quiambao is the recipient of a $3000 cash prize courtesy of EIZO.
In announcing the winners, Bree Pickering, Director of the National Portrait Gallery said the 2025 finalist portraits represented artists and sitters from all states and territories. “The National Photographic Portrait Prize exhibition foregrounds the artist’s voice,” said Pickering.
“In each of the finalist works, subjects are revealed from the artist’s point of view. The works are an invitation into the intimate world of a subject/artist relationship and a reflection of the people who make up the communities in which we all live.”
Pickering also congratulated Gadigal/Sydney-based artist George Fetting on receiving the 2025 Art Handlers’ Award for his portrait Antonio Initili – Sartoria (Tailor Shop) #1 2024.
This intimate portrait of Antonio Intili in his tailor shop captures him in a moment of reflection. Fetting is a four-time National Photographic Portrait Prize finalist, and receives a $3000 cash prize courtesy of IAS Fine Art Logistics.
The final prize, the People’s Choice Award, decided by members of the public, will be announced in October, with the winner receiving $10,000 cash courtesy of the Calvert-Jones Foundation. All finalists receive artist, copyright and licencing fees as well as freight costs and travel allowances.
The National Photographic Portrait Prize 2025 will be on show at the National Portrait Gallery, Canberra, until 12 October 2025. For more information, visit: www.portrait.gov.au for details.
Images: Hoda Afshar, Untitled #01 (from the series Code Black/Riot), 2024 | Sherry Quiambao, Mother dreams on a stone, 2024 | George Fetting, Antonio Initili – Sartoria (Tailor Shop) #1, 2024