The Path to Portrait Artist of the Year - Part 3
This is part 3 of a series that looks back at my art journey and recounts the experience of being on Portrait Artist of the Year. Part 1 can be found here. Part 2 can be found here.
From that phone call to the assigned date of filming, we had just under five weeks. Five weeks of nervous waiting, of pinching ourselves in disbelief, of anticipation. We completed paperwork, forms, outfit choices, declarations - poring through the legalese and fine print was probably the point when, for me at least, things started sinking in that this was becoming real and this moment was happening.
Amid it all, we continued our portrait practice.
Amanda and I threw ourselves into it: every spare moment of every day was put towards training for our biggest art test to date. As the filming date approached, the nerves continued to build. And with them, the uncertainty.
“I’m worried I’m going to turn up on the day and forget how to draw a face.” I must have said this to Amanda a hundred times, and even more to myself. The practice pile grew bigger, but it was becoming a collection of quantity over quality.
The pressure was getting to me. I wasn’t happy with any of my charcoal pieces. They were amateurish, unrefined, with more things working against them than in their favour. Was this a huge mistake? Self-doubt set in: I was going to be on this show and deliver a chaotic smudgy mess in front of everyone.
At home, whenever I set out to do any art, my process is often staggered over the mercy of my progress, my happiness, my energy. I might wander away from my piece, come back to it later. I might start again. I might not start at all. The fear of ruining a pristine white page, the feeling of wasting perfectly good art materials on rubbish attempts that go nowhere… it’s like a straitjacket. There are some days where the art just doesn’t art.
When I’m in front of the PAOTY cameras, none of that is going to fly.
I needed to set myself up for success. Even though I’d done my submission with charcoal, I just couldn’t get it down to a four-hour process that would deliver an acceptable portrait. I’d recently splurged on some Blacking pencils and was enjoying working with them in my sketchbook, so I hatched a new plan: they’d be my medium, my Dumbo feather for the main event. Out with the charcoal, in with the graphite. I worked on some more practice portraits and felt much more satisfied with the results.
Six days before filming. (A3, graphite)
Four days before filming. (A3, graphite)
I even decided, as much as possible, to bring elements of my home art environment to my setup. The blue cover of my visual diary was part of my world on the art table, so it would come with me and be placed nearby too - it wouldn’t be used, it just needed to be there. I’d bring my own table easel, plus the little notebook that I use on it to prop up my iPad. Any small measure that could bring some elements of familiarity to an unfamiliar world.
We packed and repacked our art materials seven different ways as the days to filming ticked down to hours. The next sunrise we would see would herald the start of our Portrait Artist experience.
Neither of us slept much that night. The alarm went off at a sparrow’s fart but it needn’t have bothered, I was already wide awake. Amanda and I gathered our art supplies (double and triple checked again) and we headed to White Bay Power Station.
It was February, during a see-saw kind of Sydney summer where one day was steaming hot, the next pouring rain. Today threatened equal measures of both, and an overcast sky paired with light humidity had me feeling a touch too warm in my long sleeved shirt.
We arrived at 7:30am. As the security guard let us in and checked our names off his list, we saw a couple of nervous looking women dressed in bright colours. They could only be artists. This was our first meeting of Ilana and Alina, and we all introduced ourselves to each other.
The calm before the artistic storm.
A woman wearing a headset approached us: our first time face-to-face with Nicole from the EndemolShine Australia team. “Follow me,” she said with a smile.
We were directed to a little behind-the-scenes refuge near the main building. Other artists would come to join us - Benedict, Emmaleen, Vayu, Zac, Ben - and eventually we numbered nine, all of us varying degrees of nervous and excited. A hot breakfast arrived and I ate it more out of obligation than hunger; I was too nervous to enjoy it.
After a while, one by one, we were micced up. It’s hardly a dignified process of lifting up your shirt and being wrapped with what can only be described as a girdle that listens. I’m sure it wasn’t just me who wondered what happens if we had to pee, as thoughts of The Naked Gun came to mind.
Then we headed to the set.
There it was, the trademark PAOTY arena. A circular structure divided into thirds, ready for three artists apiece, each segment painted with colourful backgrounds and featuring a lone chair that awaited their sitters. This was Portrait Artist of the Year. This was for us.
Who’s going to be here?
A man in a baseball cap and black shirt gathered Amanda, Emmaleen and myself. This was Stu, our assigned producer and the man in charge of our section. He was our go-to for any questions we had, any help we needed. Stu reminded me of a skateboarder, punctuating sentences with “Yeah man” and “rock on”. He showed us to our section of the set and then got the cameras ready to capture us setting up our stations.
The same process repeated for the two other groups. Each with their own producer, each filmed getting themselves ready for the art day ahead. During the process, three trendy and well-dressed individuals made their way over to us: handshakes, smiles, introductions. I inquired as to their backgrounds, and as the sledgehammer responses of “art history professor”, “gallery director”, and “artist” hit in a one-two-three combo, it dawned on me who we were talking to.
These were our judges.
Somewhere amid it all, the show’s hosts appeared: Miranda Tapsell and Luke McGregor. Both were warm and lovely. Miranda took a position to the side of the sitter’s chair and listened to an audio feed in her ear. Behind me a crane camera moved into position as in front of us, a guy with a clapper board marked the scene, and there was no more time to wait nervously or wonder how things would play out, or feel like an utter impostor for being here, because the clapper board clapped, and Miranda started speaking, and this whole thing really was happening.
“As a Darwin girl who got absolutely spoiled with south-east Asian food, I’m a huge fan of this person...”
As Miranda read through her introduction of our sitter, an idea gradually formed in my mind who it was, and when he emerged my suspicions were confirmed: foodie legend Adam Liaw. As I clapped my applause I heaved a sigh of relief: a sitter whose face, and work, I was familiar with. Adam came in and had a chat with Miranda, then the discussion stopped, and we waited. Stu asked if they could film it again. So off Adam went: Miranda read her spiel again, we clapped again, and Adam sat down again. This was our first taste of what would follow: the moments that needed to be repeated to provide slightly different conversation options to the editors and deliver slightly different camera angles for the show.
Once the other sections received their sitters - Spicks and Specks’ Myf Warhurst and comedian Rhys Nicholson - it was down to Miranda and Luke to deliver those pointy words.
“You have four hours to complete your portrait.”
Here we go…
“Good luck.”
No going back.
“Your time starts now!”
To be continued…