Finger painting by artist with nerve injury wins art award

Filipina-Australian artist Loribelle Spirovski has won the People’s Choice Award for the Archibald Prize – Australia’s most prestigious portrait art prize.

Her winning work is a portrait of Aboriginal Australian musician William Barton, which she painted with her fingers as a nerve injury made painting difficult for her.

Ms Spirovski, who has been an Archibald Prize finalist several times, said she was “overjoyed” that the public selected her work for the People’s Choice.

“It has been a difficult few years and this whole experience is the most beautiful reprieve and reward,” she said, as quoted in a press release from the Art Gallery of New South Wales.

“I am infinitely grateful to William for allowing me to paint him and so humbled by everyone’s responses to the work.”

When Ms Spirovski first met Mr Barton last October, she was recovering from a nerve injury that had impaired her painting ability.

She played Mr Barton’s music while working on his portrait.

“As the music began, my hand set the brush aside and I dipped my finger into the soft, pliant paint,” she said.

“Without a brush, painting was almost painless. As the portrait painted itself, I felt alive in a way I hadn’t for a very long time.”

Born in Philippines in 1990 to a Filipino Mother and a Serbian father, Ms Spirovski resettled in Australia in 1999. She graduated from the College of Fine Arts in Sydney in 2012.

On her website, she describes her work as being “influenced by the contrasting images of both countries, as well as her parent’s mixed European-Asian ethnicities”.

The Archibald People’s Choice Award is based on votes collected from members of the public who have viewed the finalists of the main Archibald Prize.

The A$100,000 ($64,600; £48,700) Archibald Prize this year went to Julie Fragar, the 13th woman to win the award in its 104-year-old history.

The Archibald Packing Room Prize, which is based on votes from the staff who receive the portraits and install them in the gallery, went to Abdul Abdullah for his portrait of fellow artist Jason Phu.