Peter Edwards, (born 20 November 1955), is a British painter. He won the 1994 BP Portrait Award.

Early career

In 1980 he exhibited a small self-portrait in the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition. The painting was bought by the art collector, Sir Brinsley Ford.^[1]

In 1986 his portrait of The Liverpool Poets was purchased by the National Portrait Gallery. His continuing involvement with the gallery and Robin Gibson^[2] then 20th Century Curator (later Chief Curator) led to a major one-man exhibition and tour in the Gallery in April 1990 "Contemporary Poets", which consisted of 17 large canvasses of 20 poets, alongside a poem from each poet, numerous studies, and a series of Saturday morning readings from Seamus Heaney, Douglas Dunn, Charles Causley, Wendy Cope, and Craig Raine.^[3]

On 30 July 1991, Bobby Moore unveiled Edwards' portrait of Bobby Charlton^[4] in the National Portrait Gallery, Sponsored by British Gas plc, it marked the 25th anniversary of England winning the FIFA World Cup.^[5] He later painted Ryan Giggs for the National Library of Wales.

In 1993 he exhibited in The Portrait Now show. In 1994 he won the BP Portrait Award^[6] with Portrait of an Artist's Model (of Marguerite Kelsey).^[7] She had been the model of choice, in the inter-war years, for many leading artists, including Meredith Frampton.^[8] This award led to his commission to paint Kazuo Ishiguro, which was unveiled the following summer in the National Portrait Gallery by Ismail Merchant.

Public collections

• National Portrait Gallery, London. 6 works.^[9] The portraits are of: Adrian Henri, Roger McGough, Brian Patten, (triple portrait known as) The Liverpool Poets. Seamus Heaney, John Heath-Stubbs, Willy Russell, Sir Bobby Charlton, and Kazuo Ishiguro.
• The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York^[10] of the British Poet Peter Reading, and Armenian poet Vahé Oshagan.
• National Museum Wales, painting of Tyrone O'Sullivan.^[11]
• Ulster Museum, Belfast,^[12] painting of Michael Longley.
• National Library of Wales, 6 works
• St Andrews University, portrait of Principal Struther Arnott^[13]
• Birmingham University^[14]
• Warwick University, painting of Sir Christopher Zeeman^[15]
• Ferens Gallery, Hull^[16]
• National Museums Liverpool portrait of Willy Russell
• Williamson Art Gallery, Birkenhead
• Moma Wales, Sir Kyffyn Williams,^[17] Ruth Lambert^[18]
• St Georges hospital, London
• Sheffield University^[19] Portraits of Sir Peter Middleton and Sir Harry Kroto
• Manchester University portraits of Sir Martin Harris and Alan Gilbert