Artist Angus McDonald has won the Archibald Prize’s People’s Choice award for 2024, with his portrait of Professor Marcia Langton AO.
The People’s Choice prize is valued at $5000 and is voted on by visitors to the exhibition. It’s been awarded every year since 1988.
“I am so thrilled that the public voted my work as their favourite,” said Lennox Head-based McDonald, a seven-time Archibald Prize finalist, in a statement. “It’s a privilege to be able to share Marcia’s inspirational story with a wider audience through this painting. Receiving the award is a special honour to me, but equally, it’s as much a strong vote of respect and admiration for Marcia Langton and acknowledges the profound part she has played in the struggle for Indigenous recognition and reconciliation in this country for over 50 years.”
He goes on to describe Langton as “one of our country’s deepest thinkers”. A Yiman and Bidjara woman, Langton is a professor and activist who was instrumental in developing the 2023 Indigenous Voice to Parliament.
“I placed her just right of centre to suggest a sense of stepping away and handing the baton to a younger group of activists after a lifetime of tireless commitment,” said McDonald. “She gazes up and to the left to reflect that she has persistently followed her own path.”
McDonald is also the subject of a portrait in the exhibition, appearing in Mostafa Azimitabar’s work. McDonald’s accolade comes on the heels of Sydney artist Laura Jones winning the Archibald Prize, and Melbourne street artist Matt Adnante taking out the Packing Room Prize this year. Four young artists aged between six and 18 were also recently announced as winners of the Young Archies.
The Archibald, Wynne and Sulman Prizes 2024
are on at the AGNSW until September 8, 2024
