London-based photographer Steph Wilson has won first prize in the prestigious Taylor Wessing Photo Portrait Prize 2024 for her portrait Sonam.
Second prize was awarded to Adam Ferguson for Kukatja Pintupi boy Matthew West, hunting trip, Wirrimanu/Balgo, Kukatja Country, Western Australia, 2023; Pintupi-Luritja Lutheran Pastor Simon Dixon, Ikuntji/Haast Bluff, Arrernte Country, Northern Territory, 2023; and Cousin sisters Shauna and Bridget Perdjert, Kardu Thithay Diminin Clan and Murrinhpatha language group, Kardu Yek Diminin Country, Air Force Hill, Wadeye, Northern Territory, 2023 – all from the series Big Sky. Third prize was awarded to Tjitske Sluis for Mom from the series Out of Love, Out of Necessity. The Taylor Wessing Photographic Commission was awarded to Jesse Navarre Vos for Mom, I’ll follow you still – from the series I’ll come following you.
The winning portraits are now on display as part of the Taylor Wessing Photo Portrait Prize 2024 exhibition which celebrates its 17th year at the Gallery. The 2024 judging panel included multimedia artist Pogus Caesar; curator Alona Pardo; writer and curator Lou Stoppard; and the National Portrait Gallery’s Curator of Photography Clare Freestone.
I’d like to congratulate all 55 talented photographers who were chosen to exhibit this year, and most notably our four winners. The competition embodies the Gallery’s ongoing mission to foreground contemporary photographic portraiture and we’re honored to continue to showcase the work of these imaginative and industrious photographers with the support of Taylor Wessing.
Clare Freestone Curator, Photographs, National Portrait Gallery
Steph Wilson is a British photographer, working between London and Paris. Working in fashion and editorial photography, she has previously worked for notable brands such as Mugler, Simone Rocha and Nike, and publications including Dazed, i-D and the British Journal of Photography.
Wilson’s ongoing project Ideal Mother seeks to document unconventional and ‘imperfect’ examples of motherhood. In her shortlisted portrait, Wilson captures her eponymous sitter, Sonam, who she met through Instagram following a callout for a-typical mothers willing to be photographed for the project.
Sonam’s direct and unsmiling gaze, wide legged sprawl, close cut hair and moustache make for an unexpectedly masculine image of motherhood. A wig maker by trade, Sonam actually wears a false moustache, not only as a statement of her career, but also to call back to instances when she was encouraged to embrace her masculine features by friends and family. Wilson’s ambition was to present sitters as more than just mothers, referring to all elements that contribute towards a whole person, capable of many achievements.
This is a portrait of balance, of blending, and of broadening conversations on pregnancy and parenthood, and a visual of individuality and authenticity. The judges felt this portrait was instantly eye-catching and challenges audience assumptions made on an initial reading of the portrait. The relationship between Sonam and her baby, and details revealing elements of her personality, are just some of the many layers of understanding in this image.
Second Prize £3,000: Adam Ferguson
Adam Ferguson is an Australian photographer based in New York. He holds a Bachelor of Photography from Queensland College of Art, and is currently a candidate for a Master of Fine Arts from the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology School of Art. His work has been widely exhibited, including as part of the National Photographic Portrait Prize for the National Portrait Gallery of Australia and at the Sony World Photography Awards. Work from his series Migrantes was exhibited in the Taylor Wessing Photo Portrait Prize in 2022.
Ferguson’s three shortlisted portraits were captured during extended journeys into the Northern Territory and Western Australia, made for his project and new book Big Sky (Gost Books, 2024). Made over a ten year period, the series depicts the impact of globalisation and climate change, in addition to the colonial legacy which underpins modern Australia against the backdrop of the romanticised Outback.
Pintupi Luritja, Lutheran Pastor Simon Dixon was made in collaboration with the sitter, Simon Dixon, and his local church after Ferguson met the pastor at an Easter service in Haasts Bluff, Northern Territory. The Lutheran missionaries who established Christian communities in this remote part of the country a century ago transformed the nomadic life of indigenous populations. Ferguson intentionally juxtaposes the exalting pastor in his robes with the uncultivated landscape behind.
These contrasts continue in Cousin sisters Shauna and Bridget Perdjert and Hunting Trip. The former features two young indigenous women – Shauna (left) and Bridget (right) – sitting overlooking the vast bush landscape, wearing t-shirts emblazoned with global popstar, Taylor Swift. The photograph explores the tension between the romantic fantasies of the Outback depicted in history and popular culture, with encroaching commercialisation. In Kukatja Pintupi boy Matthew West, hunting trip, Ferguson records an indigenous kangaroo hunt near the remote community of Balgo, using the hunt as a metaphor through which to critique the destruction inflicted across Australia by Western settlers.
The judges felt this series was compelling and engaging, juxtaposing elements of contemporary life with Indigenous culture. These direct and challenging images reveal the photographer’s deep understanding of the reality of community life in the Outback.
Third Prize £2,000: Tjitske Sluis
Tjitske Sluis is a Dutch photographer based in Utrecht, who came to photography through journalism. At the Dutch newspaper Dagblad De Limburger, she found herself drawn to the storytelling power of photographs, developing a career in reportage before going freelance as a documentary photographer.
Sluis’ moving series Out of Love, Out of Necessity documents the photographer’s mother during the final stages of her life, while Sluis cared for her. Sluis’ camera became an important coping device during this period of grief and disorientation and her mother, Teuntje, found a tension-relieving humour in being photographed as they created the series together. The series is about vulnerability, transience and learning how to cope with the death of a loved one, capturing tender, intimate moments.
Sluis’ portrait Mom depicts her sleeping mother – afloat on a sea of floral duvet – and speaks to the deep trust and understanding between them. Tender details reflect Teuntje’s mental resilience in the face of declining physical health. Despite her frail form, Teuntje’s “infectious spirit” is echoed through her bold lip-patterned jumper and the dog’s bright eyes. Teuntje passed away at home, just a few days after the portrait was taken. Sluis’ series also engages with the ongoing care crisis in the Netherlands, and when initially published in De Volkskrant newspaper, it prompted a debate in Dutch parliament about this critical issue. Empowered to use her photography to bring about meaningful change, Sluis is now pursuing a master’s degree in care ethics.
The judges felt the deep compassion in the relationship between artist and sitter, moving between their personal connection and the human condition. The dog’s bright eyes draw the viewers gaze and invite closer looking beyond the surrounding textures and patterns.
Taylor Wessing Photographic Commission £8,000: Jesse Navarre Vos
Jesse Navarre Vos is a photographer from Cape Town, South Africa. Vos sees portrait photography as a way of connecting with people, whether that be through his fashion and editorial work, or the ongoing personal collaboration with his mother, of which this shortlisted work is part.
Vos’ series I’ll Come Following You follows his mother, Edith Mavis Velk, who is in fact his biological paternal grandmother – his legal guardian since his birth and mother by adoption since Vos’ teens. Following a burglary at the family’s home in 2018, the previously self-reliant Edith was unable to look after herself. Vos’ shortlisted photograph depicts Edith pausing in a lift in the care facility she eventually entered. He describes that when photographing his mother in the lift, he felt she was “distant, going somewhere that I couldn’t follow.” In pausing to make the image, propping the door open with a cushion, he sustained their connection. This project is a collaboration; the photographer’s mother an equal contributor.
The judges thought the vulnerability of the sitter was perfectly communicated through the contrast between the artist’s mother and her surroundings. Details, such as the cushion holding the lift door, give this sensitive and quiet portrait an unexpected edge.
Taylor Wessing Photo Portrait Prize 2024, 14th November 2024 – 16th February 2025, National Portrait Gallery
Supported by Taylor Wessing Tickets: £8.50 / £9.50 with donation #PhotoPrize Tickets are available to purchase at npg.org.uk.
The Taylor Wessing Photo Portrait Prize 2024 exhibition will also host this year’s In Focus Photographer, Diana Markosian. Since 2015, the In Focus display has showcased new work by acclaimed photographers from around the world, including Hassan Hajjaj, Rinko Kawauchi and Pieter Hugo. This year, photographs by Diana Markosian from her series and new publication Father (Aperture, 2024) have been selected to be shown alongside works in the Taylor Wessing Photo Portrait Prize.
Father presents the artist’s journey to another place and another time, where she makes an attempt to piece together an image of a familiar stranger—her long-lost father. The images, made over the course of a decade, are accompanied by prose which further articulates the photographer’s deeply personal story. Markosian will also be joining an in-conversation event taking place in the Gallery on Friday 15 November, where she will discuss her approach to this body of work.
