This year marks ten years of the nation’s favourite art competition: Sky Arts’ Portrait Artist of the Year.
Hundreds of portraits have been painted in this time, so we thought there was no better way to celebrate than by setting a brand-new GUINNESS WORLD RECORDS title for the most people painting a portrait, with none other than national treasure Sir Lenny Henry as our sitter, who posed for last year’s Portrait Artist winner.
The team set about creating a one-of-a-kind live portrait painting event at Lindley Hall in London. On Saturday over 250 people of all ages and abilities were armed with brushes and palettes to paint their portraits of Sir Lenny in just sixty minutes.
Joining virtually were well over 1,000 people who painted along online via a live stream broadcast on Sky’s Facebook and TikTok channels hosted by presenter Yinka Bokinni. People tuned in from as far as afield as Norway, Portugal, Canada and the US.
Not only did we set a brand new GUINNESS WORLD RECORDS™, but the images and video content – including a glorious shot of Sir Lenny surrounded by 200 portraits of himself – landed a half page in the Daily Telegraph, Daily Star and a host of lifestyle titles.
Check out #paotyworldrecord for a glimpse of the fantastic portraits created on the day – it was a truly inspiring moment.
