Archibald, Wynne and Sulman Prizes 2025
- Regina Pilawuk Wilson, Sid Pattni
- 10 May—17 Aug 2025
- Art Gallery of NSW
The Art Gallery of New South Wales has just announced the finalists of this year’s Archibald, Wynne and Sulman Prizes – three of this country’s most prestigious, closely watched and vigorously contested cultural accolades. Michael Reid Sydney + Berlin is thrilled to share that two artists represented in our stable and upcoming program have been selected for the Class of 2025: Regina Pilawuk Wilson and Sid Pattni.
Congratulations to Ngan’gikurrungurr artist Regina Pilawuk Wilson, whose extraordinary, monumentally scaled painting Wupun (sun mat) has been shortlisted for this year’s Sir John Sulman Prize. Wupun (sun mat) will be on view at the Art Gallery of New South Wales from Thursday, 10 May, and is now available to acquire from Michael Reid Sydney.
Born in 1948 near Daly River, Northern Territory, Wilson is the cultural director of Durrmu Arts Aboriginal Corporation and co-founder of the Peppimenarti (meaning ‘large rock’) community. Situated amid wetlands and floodplains at the centre of the Daly River Aboriginal Reserve, 300 kilometres southwest of Darwin, Peppimenarti is an important site for Ngan’gikurrungurr people and continues to inform Wilson’s art and weaving practices – skills she inherited from her grandmother and mother.
Wilson’s Sulman-shortlisted painting depicts wupun (sun mat), which are traditionally woven for decorative use with yerrgi (pandanus) and merrepen (sand palm) by the women of Peppimenarti.
Joining Wilson at the Art Gallery of New South Wales’s flagship program is Sid Pattni, whose Self-portrait (the act of putting it back together) has been shortlisted for the 2025 Archibald Prize. The exciting news of Pattni’s Archibald Prize debut arrives as we look ahead to his first solo exhibition with Michael Reid Sydney. Works from this upcoming show are now available to preview and acquire by request.
Pattni’s Archibald self-portrait examines how he has come to understand himself through visual languages shaped by orientalist and colonial histories. “The work borrows and adapts imagery from a range of sources – including Company paintings, botanical drawings and Mughal miniatures – and links disparate pieces together,” says the Indian-Australian artist, who was born in London, raised in Kenya and now lives and works in Naarm/Melbourne.
“Crucially, these references are about getting it wrong; about producing pictures that speak of the here and now,” says the artist. “I’m very attracted to the cycle of collapsing interpretations, telling a story of how India is perceived externally and how generations of Indians came to internalise and inhabit Western projections of ‘Indian-ness’ today.”
Michael Reid Sydney + Berlin wishes to once again congratulate Regina Pilawuk Wilson and Sid Pattni. To enquire about the artists’ available work and upcoming releases, please email danielsoma@michaelreid.com.au
