Fota House: Davy Portrait Awards 2010

Davy Portrait Awards 2010:

An Exhibition Showcasing The Best of Irish Portraiture

Fota House, Fota Island, Cork

When: 8th July – 8^th August 2010

Price: Admission Free

Cork, June 2010: Fota House is delighted to announce that it will be hosting the Davy Portrait Awards this summer (8^th July – 8^th August 2010).  The exhibition aims to present the very best in contemporary portraiture and is open to artists working in traditional and non- traditional media across Ireland.

Davy, Ireland’s leading provider of stockbroking, wealth management and financial advisory services, in association with Arts & Business, selected Northern Ireland-based artist Ian Cumberland as winner of the 2010 Davy Portrait Award, which was worth £10,000.

Cumberland describes the winning portrait as ‘A celebration of flaws using the marks and colour of the paint to accurately portray the flesh and bring out all the imperfections that everyone has. From a distance the painting is very realistic, but up close its quite uneven’.

The judging panel comprised Rosie Broadley, Associate Curator of Contemporary Collections at the National Portrait Gallery in London and Brenda McParland, an international curator. The exhibition is curated by Hugh Mulholland.

The exhibition is currently on display at Farmleigh in Dublin and this will be the first time it travels to Fota House in Cork.

Fota House is a charity operated by The Irish Heritage Trust, dedicated to keeping special places open for people to enjoy forever. Profits from events go towards achieving this aim.

For images/information: Evelyn Byrne, Tel: 874 8030 evelyn@irishheritagetrust.ie or www.fotahouse.com; www.davyportraitawards.com