I could do better myself, Darling - or am I just deluded?

And so as I foxtrotted to the National Portrait Gallery on Monday to see the just-opened National Photographic Portrait Prize and Darling [painted] Portrait Prize exhibitions, lots of the spring in my step came from the prospect of voting in the "election" of a winner of each exhibition's People's Choice Award (PCA).

Each exhibition already has an official winner chosen by elite, tall poppy panellists. But the PCA process thrillingly resembles the parliamentary election process in that it enfranchises all of us (all of us who care to vote).

Sheer ignorance of art no more disqualifies one from voting in the PCAs than sheer, pig-ignorance of politics, of facts and of the truth disqualifies one from voting in general elections and in referendums.

And what's more, voters in these two NPG PCAs have a choice of 58 artists/works. This is a panoply of candidates far more rich, sparkling and excellent than for example the plodding and lacklustre party-hack choices the voters of the ACT will have in October's Assembly elections.

Then as well in making one's own, people's choice of winners there is the joy of the righteous indignation it gives to disagree with the judges' choices. It is a close cousin of the bliss it gives to dispute referee's outrageous decisions (against one's team) during football matches.

So for example lots who see this Darling Prize exhibition will be baffled by the judges' choice of Noel McKenna's portrait of his agent and friend William Nuttall in a field with trees and horses as the Darling's winner.

The judges found the painting "energetic" and "joyous" but I can see nothing "energetic" and "joyous" about it. For me the trees and horses stand about, listlessly, radiating more melancholy than joy. The horses seem stiff and stuffed (stuffed as in taxidermy).

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The judges found the painting "demonstrating the skill of an established Australian artist" while I, probably self-deludingly, think I could paint better, more interesting, more truly tree-like and truly horse-like trees and horses than Mr McKenna has.

But then the "I could do better than that myself" self-delusion is another of the joys of going to art shows.

But not for a moment do I delude myself I can paint as well as Ali Marshall. I have voted for her self-portrait My Life As A Spotted Gum 2024 as my PCA winner of the Darling Portrait Prize. Can't wait for October's declaration of the poll.

In the portrait we see a strikingly mottled Ms Marshal from behind, naked save for underpants.

She explains "I decided to paint a self-portrait highlighting an autoimmune disease with which I have recently been diagnosed. Vitiligo causes loss of skin colour in patches. It's difficult to predict how the disease will progress and there is no cure. I am fortunate to live in an area where there are some beautiful spotted gum trees. They remind me of my Vitiligo, as they shed their bark and develop interesting variations in colour ..."

Confrontingly self-revealing self portraits by artists take on a special importance now that all of us, using our iPhones, are "into" the always-flattering self-portraiture of the selfie. How narcissistically we juxtapose ourselves with gorgeous panoramas, with the cutest dogs, with captured celebrities, with (when we visit the Louvre) the Mona Lisa.

Ms Marshall's self-portrait of herself with starkly unflattering flesh reminds one of those great artists who have painted themselves unflinchingly. There are Edvard Munch's portrayals of himself throwing senile tantrums. There is van Gogh's starkly bandaged head after his crazed chopping off of some of his ear. There are Rembrandt's frank depictions of himself in gargoylesque old age with his nose having become an absurd potato of a thing.

With more justice in the world of art appreciation, Ms Marshall would have gotten the $75,000 first prize in the Darling Prize. And here I use the word "gotten" advisedly, and mischievously.

For a small storm is raging in the teacup of the Letters page of The Canberra Times as English language fossils, curmudgeons and snobs gnash their dentures against the word "gotten" as, allegedly, a vulgar new Americanism.

But the gnashers' belief is misbegotten. They have gotten their knickers into knots over nothing. "Gotten" has been in use in fine English writing for aeons.

It is even sprinkled throughout the King James Version of the Bible (1611), an ultra-English work loved for its majesty of style and revered as a treasure trove of English language expression at its loveliest.

I've just gotten my King James Bible down from its shelf. Blowing the dust off it and opening it I find that its first use of the grand old word is at Genesis 4:1.

"And Adam knew Eve his wife; and she conceived, and bare Cain, and said, I have gotten a man from the Lord."

How elegant the King James' use of the word "knew" in these contexts. If only the popular press would report just that "Donald Trump knew porn-star Stormy Daniels" instead of being so blush-makingly explicit about their carnal interface.