National Portrait Gallery

Amy Jade Winehouse ('Amy-Blue'), by Marlene Dumas, oil on canvas, 2011, NPG 6948

A new acquisition: Amy-Blue by Marlene Dumas

The Gallery recently unveiled a new addition to the Contemporary Collection: a portrait of the singer-songwriter Amy Winehouse, who passed away last year, painted by the Amsterdam-based, South African artist Marlene Dumas . Traditionally, the Gallery collects portraits made from life, so what does it mean for the Gallery to acquire a posthumous work?…

By Inga Fraser, Assistant Curator (Contemporary & 20th Century Collections)

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12 December 2012

Contemporary

Fred Daniels: New Research

The Gallery’s long interest in the life and career of British film-stills photographer Fred Daniels began in 1988, with the important acquisition of works from the photographer’s widow Nancy Eckart. In 2010, Nigel Arthur, BFI Stills Curator, was awarded a grant from the Understanding British Portraits Network to research Daniels’s work more fully, particularly with new information from his son, Jonty. Since then we have discovered many unknown studies by Daniels that were published in leading society magazines of the 1940s and 1950s.…

By Helen Trompeteler, Assistant Curator of Photographs

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6 December 2012

The artist never lies?

How much control do we have over our images? When we view a portrait, do we expect it to depict someone as they are or as they’d like to be? Would you feel differently if it was a portrait of you? These questions struck me when I was looking at William Hoare’s portrait of Alexander Pope for our new display, The Art of Drawing: Portraits from the collection, 1670-1850. …

By Clare Barlow, Assistant Curator

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28 November 2012

On being painted by Humphrey Ocean

Humphrey Ocean, whose display A handbook of modern life opens at the Gallery this month, began making a series of portraits of visitors to his south London studio – friends, family and people he knows – in 2006; a diverse group who now number almost two hundred. The portraits share a format, and by using gouache, a kind of thickened watercolour, on paper, Ocean can work very swiftly. None of the portraits took more than forty-five minutes. …

By Rosie Broadley, Associate Curator

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22 November 2012

Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill by Sir William Newenham Montague Orpen 1916 NPG L250

What makes a great portrait?

I hesitate to use the word ‘great’ when discussing art. Like other over-used superlatives - ‘iconic’ is another I make a point of avoiding – the very familiarity of the term, and the ease with which it trips off the tongue, deny the significance intended. The idea of a ‘great’ painting or sculpture raises many questions. What makes a particular image or object so distinctive and compelling as to transcend the merely excellent? How is greatness judged? And why, I ask, did I find myself using the dreaded adjective when recently being interviewed on television about a portrait that has just gone on display in our 20th century galleries?…

By Paul Moorhouse, 20th Century Curator

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14 November 2012

20th Century

The Judges' View: Taylor Wessing Photographic Portrait Prize 2012

The great strength of the Taylor Wessing Photographic Portrait Prize is that it brings together a wide of images, from reportage and documentary photographs to studio portraits. This year some 5,000 photographs were submitted for the competition. As chair of the selection panel, I encourage my fellow judges (this year Emma Hardy, Lauren Heinz, Glyn Morgan, Sean O’Hagan and Terence Pepper) to hold individual opinions and to argue for the works they find particularly appealing. Consensus on the final selection is always reached, but the exhibition is more diverse as a result of this debate.…

By Sandy Nairne, Director, National Portrait Gallery