They also avoided Jason Phu’s supposed but unrecognisable portrait of Hugo Weaving, perhaps mainly because of Phu’s grandstanding about boycotting the Australian pavilion in Venice.
Instead they chose Julie Fragar's Flagship Mother Multiverse (Justene), a work that in my view is a singular combination of blandness and gimmickry, while also arguably ticking a couple of ideological boxes by rewarding a female artist’s picture of another female artist. But the deepest problem with this picture is that, unlike Peter Wegner’s portrait of Sue Chrysanthou which I nominated as the best painting in the show, and which illustrates the depth and yet economy of its art, this is scarcely painting at all.
The likeness is photographic and expressionless, and all the paraphernalia around it looks like something put together digitally. The result reminds me of Oscar Wilde’s famous remark when he saw W.P. Frith’s The Derby Day (1856-58): “Was it all done by hand?”
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Brisbane artist Julie Fragar wins 2025 Archibald Prize
Julie Fragar has won the $100,000 Archibald Prize, the country’s most coveted – often controversial – portraiture award, with her painting of friend and fellow artist Justene Williams.
Uighur artist refuses to be hemmed in by borders of politics
Aniwar Mamat’s work is inspired by traditional felt makers in China’s Xinjiang province as well as by the corrugated iron sheets outside his window during Beijing’s Covid lockdown.
The Archibald judges never fail to surprise in their instinct for mediocrity. It wasn’t clear which picture they would settle on as this year’s winner; they tend not to choose the most photographically vulgar works — they leave those to the packing room — nor the more grotesque outsider pieces.