John Godfrey CBE, High Sheriff. Oil on canvas on panel. 70 x 50 cm
Miriam Escofet has yet again had a work accepted for the BP Portrait Award! This is her fourth success in the exhibition in almost as many years.
She says of this year’s piece – ‘This portrait was a commissioned work. John Godfrey contacted me after seeing my portrait ‘Gillian’ in the BP Portrait award two years ago. He wanted to commission a portrait of himself in his High Sheriff costume, having been made High Sheriff of Lincolnshire in 2010.
We discussed ideas for the composition and met before I travelled to his home to spend a whole day on the first sitting. This was mainly comprised of taking photographs, from which I later decided on the final composition.
I was very conscious that I wanted to capture all the detail and gravitas of the clothing, but retain a relaxed pose. I did not want the costume to dominate the sitter, but rather have it as the context for the portrait.
I enjoyed working with the restricted colour palette the High Sheriff costume offered as it then allowed me to be very clear as to where I wanted the focal points of light to be. The white collar and cuffs were a gift in this sense’.
The exhibition will be at the National Portrait Gallery from the 21 June to 23 September 2012.
Fantastic piece of work !!! will be visiting and voting …….. well done