'The Royal Family: A Centenary Portrait'

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© John Wonnacott / National Portrait Gallery, London

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'The Royal Family: A Centenary Portrait'

by John Wonnacott
oil on canvas on foamboard, 2000
144 1/4 in. x 98 1/8 in. (3663 mm x 2493 mm) overall
Commissioned, 2000
Primary Collection
NPG 6479

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Commissioned by the Trustees in 2000 to celebrate the 100th Birthday of HM Queen Elizabeth, The Queen Mother.

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  • Alison Smith, Charles III: The Making of a King, 2023, p. 98
  • Cannadine, Sir David (Introduction); Cooper, Tarnya; Stewart, Louise; MacGibbon, Rab; Cox, Paul; Peltz, Lucy; Moorhouse, Paul; Broadley, Rosie; Jascot-Gill, Sabina, Tudors to Windsors: British Royal Portraits, 2018 (accompanying the exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery from The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Texas, USA, 7 October 2018 -3 February 2019. Bendigo Art Gallery, Australia, 16 March - 14 July 2019.), p. 209 Read entry

    Commissioned by the National Portrait Gallery to celebrate the 100th birthday of the Queen Mother, this portrait of four generations of royals was suggested by the artist himself, as a way of immortalising the royal family on the eve of a new millenium. John Wonnacott depicts his sitters in the White Drawing Room at Buckingham Palace, recalling Lavery's 1913 portrait of the family of George V (NPG 1745).

  • Saywell, David; Simon, Jacob, Complete Illustrated Catalogue, 2004, p. 731
  • Shulman, Alexandra, Elizabeth II Princess, Queen, Icon, 2021, p. 118

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Current affairs

The world celebrates the start of a new millennium. Britain marks the occasion with a series of new buildings and landmarks including the Millennium Dome, the London Eye, the Millennium Bridge, and the Millennium Stadium. While the Dome was criticised by politicians and the public for wasting public funds, and the Bridge suffered initial stability problems, other projects have become major landscape and public attractions.

Art and science

Tate Modern opens as a national gallery of international modern art under the directorship of Nicholas Serota. The gallery, housed in the former Bankside Power Station, took the novel step of arranging the collection by theme rather than chronologically. As well as the collection galleries, Tate Modern has two large temporary exhibition spaces, and commissions installation projects for the enormous Turbine Hall.

International

British troops are deployed to Sierra Leone to establish order and evacuate foreign nationals from the country torn apart by civil war. Following a ceasefire President Kabbah declared the civil war officially over in 2002.
George W. Bush becomes President of the United States after a close election where he lost the popular vote, but won the electoral vote thanks to a controversial Supreme Court decision on Florida.

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