BP Portrait Award 2010

The BP Portrait Award, now in its twenty-first year, is one of Britain's most prestigious art prizes, and is the leading showcase for artists throughout the world specialising in portraiture. Last year nearly 300,000 people visited the exhibition, which is based on the competition open to all artists aged eighteen and over from around the world. The catalogue features sixty works from an international list of artists, which together display a diverse range of styles and painterly techniques. It also includes a fascinating essay by bestselling novelist Rose Tremain and an illustrated article by the 2009 Travel Award winner Isobel Peachey. Peachey describes the journeys she undertook to Switzerland and Belgium to document historical re-enactment weekends in which participants recreated life in a medieval castle and a Napoleonic battle. Her account and the accompanying portraits capture her sitters' passionate involvement in recreating the past, and their dual identity as contemporary people re-enacting historical events.