Museum acquisition: National Portrait Gallery Raqib Shaw's The Final Submission in Fire on Ice (2021–22) joins the collection

Raqib Shaw's The Final Submission in Fire on Ice (2021–22) has joined the collection of the National Portrait Gallery, London, where it is currently installed in Room 30 on Floor 1, in the Weston Wing, which houses the institution's Contemporary Collection, exploring portraits from 2000 to today.

Born in Calcutta, India, and raised in Kashmir, Raqib Shaw comes from a family of merchants and his early experience of living among antiques, jewellery and exotic fabrics and carpets has informed his highly intricate and brightly coloured paintings. He creates opulent visions of unearthly realms populated by cavorting monkey kings, leather-strapped centaurs and fearsome tiger-headed and zebra-mounted warriors. The world he portrays is beautiful, terrifying, debauched, luxurious and steeped in mythology, with a thrilling synergy between the fantastical imagery and the delicacy of his technique. 

Shaw's paintings often take inspiration from eastern and western mythology, as well as masterpieces from art history. He paints figures, carpets, costumes and mythical landscapes with exquisite skill, using a painstaking method that recalls the cloisonné technique used since ancient times to decorate metalwork and ceramics.