INTROVERSION - Finalist in the 2025 Brisbane Portrait Prize
- stevepwhitfield
- Sep 18, 2025
- 2 min read
Every now and then something brilliant happens…
I am over-the-moon to announce that my self-portrait, INTROVERSION was chosen as a finalist in this year’s Brisbane Portrait Prize!
Maybe I’ll have a chance at winning the People’s choice award… Please click the link to VOTE for INTROVERSION
Medium: Acrylic on Canvas
Dimensions: 94cm x 125cm
About the artwork:
This self-portrait is a visual elegy born from the most profound sorrow – the death of the artist’s daughter, Bronte.
“This artwork is not an attempt to find closure – there is none – but a way of speaking the unspeakable, of holding space for her absence, and of honouring the raw, human truth of mourning.”
The portrait takes inspiration from a photograph of the artist cleaning Bronte’s shower. It was taken on the day his family moved out of the rental house where she had fought bowel cancer for three years. Bronte died 5 months earlier, aged just 25. The work captures the artist’s fractured sense of identity and the mask he now wears to disguise his grief while facing the day-to-day in a world forever changed.
“A quiet, brutal moment of solitude to reflect. It never gets easier. Grief has seen me become an extremely reserved, quiet shadow of my former self. Somewhat of an introvert it seems.”
About the artist:
Steven Whitfield is a Brisbane based illustrator and graphic designer with a passion for visual storytelling. With a career spanning over 30 years, his creative approach is grounded in versatility, where technical skill meets imagination. Influenced by the intricate works of M.C. Escher, concept art and Post-Impressionism, his work combines detailed precision with bold colours.
To see the finalists on the walls, the exhibition is at the Queensland State Library Gallery, and runs from 20th September to 9th November.
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