Polished, glamorous and even playful on the surface, there’s an underlying tension in the modern pop art paintings of Melbourne-based Chris Watts. Yes, their bold colours and clean lines evoke joy and clarity, but linger for a moment and an undertone of vulnerability often comes through.
“With WILD CARD, the people in [the pieces] are very elegant, very chic — but at the same time, there’s still a bit of vulnerability in their eyes and their emotion,” says Watts. “You can see a bit of a wildness or unpredictability. So, although they look so polished, so perfect, there’s still a bit of cheekiness or something underlying in all the pieces. That’s why I named it WILD CARD.”
Watts explains further: “If you go to the exhibition, you’ll see that as a whole — when you see them in the same space — they’re all kind of… flirting with each other. They’re all just looking at each other in this kind of weird, cheeky way. So, it’s like there’s this one big hot pot of this wildness overall.”
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The exhibition coincides with the recent announcement of this year’s Archibald, Wynne and Sulman Prize-winners at the Art Gallery of New South Wales. Richard Lewer has won the former for his portrait of Pitjantjatjara Elder, senior artist and ngangkari (traditional healer), Iluwanti Ken. Lewer’s work was selected from 1034 entries for the Archibald Prize in 2026 and is one of 59 finalist works on display at the Art Gallery of New South Wales. Watts is one of these finalists with his portrait of Mitch Brown, the first AFL player to come out publicly as bisexual.
Meanwhile, Yolŋu artist Gaypalani Waṉambi has won the Wynne Prize 2026 for her etching on metal, The Waṉambi tree, depicting Wuyal, an important ancestor of the Marrakulu clan. Lucy Culliton has won the Sir John Sulman Prize for her work Toolah, artist model, an intricately detailed painting of Toolah, one of her beloved rescue greyhounds.
Watts explains his choice of subject for the Archibald entry: “Seeing Mitch share his story last year in the media — I thought it was incredibly brave, [given] a backdrop of a lot of homophobia in AFL on the field and off the field. I thought it was such amazing thing he did. I said to him when we first met: ‘you really changed history in Australia.’ So, I thought that was incredibly brave, and that’s why I wanted to paint him for the Archibald this year.”
The process to create the work involved meeting with Mitch Brown to hear his story, taking photographs, drawing sketches by hand and then switching to digital in order to achieve the distinctive pop art look. The multimedia lens is no surprise, given Watts’ background in music as well as a family lineage steeped in graphic design.
“It was a bit tricky because obviously my style doesn’t have much detail. I have to really try and capture someone’s portrait with such minimal colours,” says Watts.
WILD CARD is on show at Art2Muse gallery until 18th May, with a successful, busy event having taken place there with Watts and Brown on Saturday 9th May.
