Last updated: 28 October 2026
David Hamilton is the Northern Irish artist behind calm, witty figurative paintings in flat acrylic colour, after a long career painting sets for the entertainment industry. Here you will find our take on his work, where to see David Hamilton now, his prints and paintings for sale, and his two panels in this year’s War Child auction.
Our take on David Hamilton
Hamilton paints people in clean, simplified spaces: a piano on a beach, a family posed like a film poster, a figure under a big sky. Much of it starts from life. “I like to describe my work as deriving mainly from my interactions with people from whom I am constantly creating a diary of shared life experiences, both real and reimagined,” he writes in the artist’s statement on Fierce Nice.
His two War Child panels are both acrylic on gesso. In In the Sun, only the top of a woman’s head peeks up from the bottom edge, her green eyes looking straight out. Behind her rise soft bands of yellow hills under a flat beige sky, with a small yellow sun. Meanwhile, Into the Sun shows a pair of legs in pink trousers and pink heels kicking up out of a speckled yellow ground. One heel hooks the handle of a red umbrella against a pale blue sky.
The humour runs through his bigger work too. For his 2024 AIB Portrait Prize piece he painted a family beside a “huge and terrifying new celestial body”, the fiscal black hole, as he told the National Gallery of Ireland. His larger canvases sell for thousands, so these panels are an easy way in.
David Hamilton: the essentials
- From Northern Ireland. He studied art and design at the Art and Design Centre in Belfast, part of the University of Ulster: a BA (1978) and a postgraduate diploma (1979).
- Worked for many years across Ireland, the UK and Europe as a scenic artist and art director, making themed sets for the entertainment industry, then began making his own paintings in 2008, according to the National Gallery of Ireland.
- Shortlisted for the AIB Portrait Prize 2024 with The Family Bowles and the Fiscal Black Hole, and highly commended in the Hennessy Portrait Prize at the National Gallery of Ireland.
- Shortlisted for the Jackson’s Painting Prize in 2023 and a contestant on Sky Arts Landscape Artist of the Year the same year.
- Won the BBC at Seventy art competition in Belfast in 2012. He has shown in the Royal Academy, Royal Ulster Academy and Royal Hibernian Academy annual exhibitions.
- Not to be confused with the British photographer of the same name, or the Melbourne painter David Hamilton.
Where to see David Hamilton now
- Coming up: Sound & Vision 2026, a War Child charity auction online from 27 October to 12 November 2026, with the works on view at Iconic Images Gallery, London, 6 to 8 November. The pieces are In the Sun (2026), acrylic on gesso panel, 15 x 21 cm (5.9 x 8.3 in), lot page, and Into the Sun (2026), acrylic on gesso panel, 15 x 21 cm (5.9 x 8.3 in), lot page.
- AIB Portrait Prize 2024 (shortlist exhibition), National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin, 9 November 2024 to 9 March 2025.
How to buy a David Hamilton print or painting
David Hamilton sells giclée prints through an Irish print shop, priced in euros, and originals through Jackson’s:
- Be Yourself: a giclée print on Hahnemühle Photo Rag, edition of 150, from €79 for 23 x 30 cm (9 x 12 in) to €295 for 46 x 61 cm (18 x 24 in), from Fierce Nice, which stocks ten of his prints from €55.
- The Mulligans: acrylic on linen, 76 x 61 cm (29.9 x 24 in), shown in the Jackson’s Painting Prize 2023, £10,000 from Jackson’s Art Gallery.
- In the Sun, 2026: a small acrylic on gesso panel in the War Child Sound & Vision auction, bidding from £100 until 12 November 2026 (bid here).
- Into the Sun, 2026: a small acrylic on gesso panel in the same auction, bidding from £100 until 12 November 2026 (bid here).
David Hamilton FAQs
Which David Hamilton is in the War Child auction?
The Northern Irish painter, a former scenic artist and art director who studied in Belfast. He is not the British photographer of the same name.
Can I buy a David Hamilton print?
Yes. Fierce Nice sells his giclée prints in editions of 150, from €55 for the smallest size.
Was David Hamilton on Landscape Artist of the Year?
Yes. He was a contestant on Sky Arts Landscape Artist of the Year in 2023.
Where can I see his work in London?
His two War Child panels are on view at Iconic Images Gallery from 6 to 8 November 2026.
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Main image: David Hamilton beside his painting Airship Over The Big Beach Busk. Courtesy Jackson’s Art Gallery. Cropped and framed by CoolCuration. Exhibition dates, prices, auction results and market figures last checked: 28 October 2026.
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