Archibald prize 2021: Peter Wegner wins $100,000 prize for ‘brilliant’ portrait of Guy Warren at 100

Peter Wegner has won Australia’s most prestigious painting prize for his portrait of the artist Guy Warren, who turned 100 in April.

Celebrating its own centenary, the 2021 Archibald prize winner was chosen unanimously by the judges and announced on Friday by the Art Gallery of New South Wales director, Michael Brand, who described the painting as “a brilliant portrait”.

Speaking from lockdown in Melbourne via video link, Wegner – who has been a finalist five times – said: “When Michael called, my wife burst into tears, and I was speechless. This is an unbelievable moment in my life. It’s the culmination of years of my time in the studio and validation of my work.

Related: Archibald prize 2021: Grace Tame, Ben Quilty, Eryn Jean Norvill and more – in pictures

“Guy Warren turned 100 in April – he was born the same year the Archibald prize was first awarded in 1921. This is not why I painted Guy, but the coincidence is nicely timed,” he continued.

Warren – a celebrated artist who himself won the Archibald in 1985, for his portrait of the artist Bert Flugelman – appeared in person at the Art Gallery of NSW event, with the same fuchia pink pullover draped about his shoulders as depicted in his portrait.

The centenarian artist, who lives in the lower north shore Sydney suburb of Greenwich, said he had never met the Melbourne-based Wegner until he was approached to sit for the portrait.

“I’d like to know the guy better because he’s obviously got an enormous amount of talent,” he said.

“It’s a bloody good painting ... it’s in the full tradition of good portrait painting and that tradition goes back a hell of a long way.

“Secondly, it is a very good likeness. And thirdly, I’m told, it says something about my character, but I’m not the one to be the judge of that, I don’t know.”

Speaking at Friday’s announcement, Brand said if he reached the 100-yer landmark, he hoped to look as content as Warren.

But the centenarian later disputed Brand’s assessment.

“No, I don’t feel content ... what a strange thing to say. No, I’ve always felt just curious as to what’s around the next corner,” he said.

Uppermost in his mind was “whether I’ll live long enough to finish another bloody good painting.

“I want to live long enough to live another 10, 20, 50 years, and keep on painting if I can,” he said.

Wegner’s painting was one of 52 finalists, from 938 entries – the second highest number of entries on record, after last year’s prize. This year’s finalists included portraits of Grace Tame, Ben Quilty, Eryn Jean Norvill, Blak Douglas and Kate Ceberano, whose portrait – by Kirsty Neilson – was selected by Art Gallery of NSW staff for the Packing Room prize, which was announced last week. It’s the first year in the Archibald’s history to have gender parity between the finalist artists.

Nyapanyapa Yunupiŋu won the Wynne prize for landscape painting with Garak – Night Sky, which depicts the journey of Djulpan, or the Seven Sisters star clusters also known as Pleiades.

“I was born on the beach at Yirrkala near where the Dhawu (large Banyan tree) stands. My father, Muŋgurrawuy, lived there with my mum, Buŋay, who was one of his many wives. I used to watch my father painting and he would tell me that later I would paint on my own. I spent many hours watching him,” Yunupiŋu said in a statement.

“The songline of the Djulpan Seven Sisters starts all the way north in the islands of Maŋgatharra (Indonesia) and ends right here. Right now is the season when we can see them in the stars, and they cry for us. I share this prize with my seven sisters, some of whom have passed away.”

Related: Archibald prize turns 100: love it or hate it, it reflects a changing nation

The Tasmania-based artist Georgia Spain won the Sulman prize for subject painting for her work Getting Down or Falling Up – a painting which, the artist says, “explores the idea of physical tension and connection captured in moments of conflict or pleasure.

“Limbs reach, push, pull and flail to reflect the feeling of getting up and falling down, over and over again.”

The prize was guest judged by Elisabeth Cummings, who described it as “a strong, confident image full of energy and movement. Georgia Spain’s use of the figure is imaginative and very much her own, and the painting is well resolved, vibrant and alive.”

• The finalists for the 2021 Archibald prize, the Wynne prize and the Sulman prize are now on show at the gallery. Coinciding with this year’s exhibition is Archie 100, celebrating the portrait prize’s history, which opens on 5 June