RBSA Portrait Prize 2026 Winning Artists Announced

At a packed Preview Evening held on Tuesday 5 May, RBSA President Ed Isaacs officially opened the RBSA Portrait Prize 2026 and thanked judges Brian Bishop, Senior Lecturer in Fine Art and Course Director for BA (Hons) in Fine Art at Birmingham School of Art, Anthony Connolly RP, President, Royal Society of Portrait Painters, and Dr Hannah Higham, Head of Collections, Royal Academy of Arts.

As always with RBSA Prize Exhibitions, there was a range of prizes to be awarded, with the winning artists having been selected by the judges that afternoon.

The winning artists were:

First Prize
Jeremy Chih-Hao Chuang
Ephemeral Intimacy_24SPMAY-Painting Studio

Second Prize
Nic Dillon
Maria Asleep On Mum’s Sofa

Third Prize
JR Root
Portrait Of Meg VI

Highly Commended
Ruth Baker
Bjorn

Highly Commended
Sam Kennedy
Mulberry Dreams

Highly Commended
Sara Myers
Time And Memory

Highly Commended
Emily Porter-Salmon
br41n r0t

Highly Commended
Jake Simpson
The Gentleman

Highly Commended
Martha Tromans
Mana

Congratulations to everyone selected for the exhibition and to our prize winning artists.