“The quirky, the mundane”: Portrait of Britain selects some of its best winners yet

Portrait of Britain has announced its Volume 6 winners, with 100 winning portraits and another 100 images making this year’s shortlist. The winning images will appear across the UK on JCDecaux digital screens from 8 January. As in previous years, the goal of the competition is to show the breadth of the traditions and stories found across the UK, but no previous years have encapsulated this goal quite as successfully as the 2024 line-up.

Winners include London-based Ollie Adegboye, whose recent series, Bàbá, Father, took him across London in order to capture Black fathers and their children. Mathushaa Sagthidas’ winning portrait shows the British disability activist Shani Dhanda, who Shaw Trust recognised last year for her work, which spans children books, keynote talks and British Vogue features.

Euan Myles secures a place with a portrait of a young boy taking part in Up Helly Aa festival, where 1000 people in Shetland march through Lerwick each year and set fire to a replica Viking longship.

We also have stories like Tasmina Haq’s, a member of the Birmingham initiative Muslim Girls Fence. Garry Jones photographs Tasmina Haq holding a mask and a blade. Organisations like Muslim Girls Fence, facilitating safe spaces for Muslim girls and women to express themselves, are given crucial weight in Portrait of Britain as traditions old and new become a central theme.

“Portrait of Britain does not profess to be a scientifically collected sample of the UK public, nonetheless its representation is wide and far-reaching, with images of people from all walks of life across the country,” says the Portrait of Britain site.

Mick Moore, CEO and creative director of British Journal of Photography adds: “Portrait of Britain captures the quirky, the mundane, the here and now of the extraordinary everyday in which we live.” Previous Portrait of Britain winners include Afolabi Aderopo, Max Kessell and Sam Gregg – who released a brand new series about Naples last year.

Portrait of Britain is organised by British Journal of Photography and JCDecaux UK.