Backstage at the Archibald Prize: paper planes and steel-plate etchings When Ben Quilty won the Archibald Prize at the Art Gallery of NSW in Sydney yesterday [April 15, 2011], it was less than a decade since he had received his first real career boost -- the receipt of the 2002 Brett Whiteley Travelling Art Scholarship . And Margaret Olley, one of the judges of that scholarship in 2002, was the very appropriate subject of Quilty's Archibald winning portrait. Both artist and sitter were at the gallery when the $50,000 prize was announced. Quilty's two young children, Joe and Olivia, made paper planes from copies of the press release, their youth somehow showing how an art prize that is 90 years old is still going strong. I observed all this as the visual arts reporter for the Daily Telegraph . I first met Ben Quilty many years ago when he was just starting to exhibit his work to the the beginnings of what would become acclaim.  It must have been just after he won the Brett Whiteley Travelling Art Scholarship in 2002. Right back then, it was obvious he was a young man going places. And boy, could he paint. I thought he would win the Archibald a few years ago when he entered a wonderful portrait of Beryl Whiteley, who established and endowed the travelling scholarship in her son's name. It was a great painting of Beryl; so full of steely determination and the will to survive, no matter what.