Too controversial for the judges

While the Art Gallery of NSW promotes “diversity” and “controversy” surrounding the Archibald Prize, its interpretation of those terms is severely limited. Of 57 portraits shortlisted this year from 904 entries, 60 per cent are depictions of artists by other artists or self-portraits. Nor, as The Australian’s art critic, Christopher Allen, writes, does the gallery have any taste for real controversy: “Like the art world in general, it loves the kitsch idea of art as provocative and dangerous but adheres in practice to a position of timidity, risk aversion and moral conformity.”

Glancing through the mainly motley collection of shortlisted paintings, readers could only wonder what the excluded entries were like. Outstanding, in some cases, including one that was too diverse and too controversial for the judges – the perceptive portrait of Jewish leader Alex Ryvchin by The Australian’s editorial cartoonist, Johannes Leak. The work, an excellent likeness, captures the spirit and concerns of a man who has played a key role in his besieged community since the Hamas massacre of October 7, 2023. Mr Ryvchin, 41, came to Australia in 1988 as a four-year-old Ukrainian refugee, speaking only Russian, when his family fled the Soviet Union’s relentless persecution of Jews. Four years ago, despite the popularity of Indigenous subjects in the Archibald, Leak’s portrait of Jacinta Nampijinpa Price also was rejected.

As Allen writes, the Ryvchin portrait easily eclipses most of those selected to be hung this year. Most observers outside the narrow confines of the art world would agree. It was left out, Allen believes, “either because of actual anti-Semitism or the fear of anti-Semitic reaction to the hanging of the picture”. That is despite the manifest generosity of Australia’s Jewish community to the arts for generations. The nation’s (supposedly) most prestigious art prize needs to lift its game.