Gallery seeks portrait artist for poll winner

Gallery seeks portrait artist for poll winner

The New Zealand Portrait Gallery is looking for an artist to
paint a picture of the late Celia Lashlie who won a poll in
which members of the public were asked “Who’s missing?
from the national collection held on the Wellington
waterfront.

The face of Lashlie, the social justice campaigner who
achieved worldwide fame for telling mothers how to handle
their teenage sons, will join those of The Queen, Kiri te
Kanawa, Sir Edmund Hillary and about 200 others at the
gallery.

She was a runaway winner when the public were asked to vote
last month for the most deserving New Zealander to join the
illustrious faces in the portrait collection.

Lashlie died of cancer at the age of 61 in February.

“We were delighted with the overwhelming response and our
voters’ enthusiasm,” gallery director Gaelen Macdonald
said Sunday in a statement calling on established artists to
submit expressions of interest in being commissioned to
produce a posthumous portrait of Celia Lashlie.

She asked artists to submit samples of recent portraiture
commissions by July 3 with a brief statement about their
practice including their desire to paint Celia’s portrait.

Gaelen Macdonald said it was planned to select the winning
submission in conjunction with Celia’s family on July 6.

It is seeking funds for the commission.

ENDS

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