David Titlow wins Taylor Wessing photographic portrait prize
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Version 0 of 1. Working with children and animals rarely gets as good as this: an intimate portrait of an infant being introduced to a dog, an image that on Tuesday night won one of the most prestigious photography prizes in the UK. The winner of the 2014 Taylor Wessing photographic portrait prize was the fashion photographer David Titlow, named at an awards ceremony at the National Portrait Gallery. Titlow’s winning portrait was called Konrad Lars Hastings Titlow, the name of his infant son. The picture was taken the morning after what appeared an idyllic night before. Titlow said he had been at a large midsummer party in Rataryd, Sweden, on the occasion of the shot. “Everyone was a bit hazy from the previous day’s excess. My girlfriend passed our son to the subdued revellers on the sofa – the composition and back light was so perfect I had to capture the moment.” Titlow is a former musician turned fashion and advertising photographer. He has been working in the industry since the early 1990s and has been commissioned by the Guardian, Vanity Fair, Esquire, Rolling Stone, and Vice magazine, among other publications. He wins £12,000 and his will be the star picture in the exhibition which accompanies the prize and opens to the public, at the London gallery, on Thursday. Sandy Nairne, director of the National Portrait Gallery, called Titlow’s photograph “a fascinating and compelling image”. He added: “I offer my thanks to all the many photographers who submitted this year allowing the judges to choose such a strong exhibition.” The £3,000 second prize was awarded to Jessica Fulford-Dobson, for a picture entitled Skate Girl, which came from a series documenting Afghan girls attending the Skateistan project in Kabul, a scheme providing education, leadership teaching, cultural awareness and, of course, skateboarding. Birgit Püve was third with her photograph of nine-year-old Estonian twin boys holding a nervous chicken; and Blerim Racaj was fourth with his photograph of disaffected young Kosovars. Other prizes given out included the John Kobal new work award, for photographers under 30, which went to Laura Pannack, a Central St Martins graduate, for her photograph of a young Jewish girl named Chayla at Shul. Pannack wins a £4,000 prize and a commission to photograph a sitter connected with the UK film industry for the NPG collection. The judges have selected 59 portraits for the show from the initial 4,193 submissions entered by 1,793 photographers. • Taylor Wessing photographic portrait prize is at the National Portrait Gallery 13 November to 22 February |