As Sunday was Mother's Day, we would like to celebrate the success of Jennifer McRae; the Scottish artist, who began her career as a single mum, has won a major national art prize with her tribute to single parenthood. McRae has been named as the winner of the 2019 Lynn Painter-Stainers Prize for her portrait of three generations of women in her family: her granddaughter, her daughter and her. The painting, Past, Present and Future: Tracing the Female Line, was described by the judges as, ‘a beautifully rendered self-portrait showing the artist at work. It demonstrated great sensitivity.’

McRae, a member of the Royal Scottish Academy, faced difficulties at the start of her career, ‘When I started in art, I was a single mum, which was really hard. Back then, being a young single mum was more unusual. But my art school, Gray’s School of Art in Aberdeen, made everything easy. They helped me hugely. It made such a big difference to my life.’ McRae has marked many great achievements during her career; she has had her work displayed in the Scottish National Portrait Gallery and the National Portrait Gallery in London. Her success in the Lynn Painter-Stainers Prize means that she has won the UK’s highest-funded annual art competition for representative and figurative art, taking home a prize of £20,000.

Created in 2005 by The Worshipful Company of Painter-Stainers and The Lynn Foundation, the competition champions the skill of draughtsmanship and figurative painting. The Lynn Painter-Stainers competition is open to any artist resident in the UK painting or drawing works of representational or figurative art and over 18-years-old.