What happens when a former MasterChef Australia host is a celebrity guest on another show and thinks one of the hosts could be doing a better job? If it’s Matt Preston, he tells him.
When Portrait Artist Of The Year, co-hosted by Luke McGregor and Miranda Tapsell, has its second season premiere, Matt, documentary maker John Safran and singer Dannii Minogue are the three celebrity sitters. Each of them is having their portrait painted by three artists, who have just four hours to do it in.
One hour into the session, Luke tells the artists how much time they have left – and then he asks Matt if that was a good time call. Matt is extremely blunt in his response.
“He is a riot,” Miranda tells TV WEEK. “I found it so hard to keep it together.
“Matt being forthright obviously comes from a good place. He wants the people around him to be better. But Luke is such a different personality. He’s very scared of hurting people’s feelings.”
Luke and Miranda get creative when it comes to the next time call they do. Will Matt be impressed?
During the four hours, Luke says he and Miranda pick up some “really cool little tidbits” about the sitters, “like Dannii Minogue saying she paints rocks”, When the time is up, the artists turn their easels around and the sitters get to choose one portrait to take home. Luke tells TV WEEK he’s curious about which painting he’d pick if he was one of the sitters.
“Would I pick one that makes me look a little better, or a little worse, or is really accurate?” he wonders. “I think if someone didn’t give me a more powerful chin, I’d probably say no!”
The judges – National Portrait Gallery director Bree Pickering, associate professor of art history Robert Wellington and award-winning artist Abdul Abdullah – can only choose one artist of the nine to move forward into the semi-finals. Who will it be?
Catch Portrait Artist Of The Year on Sunday at 7.30pm on ABC TV or ABC iview.
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