J K Rowling Displayed in 3-D Painted Portrait

NOT CURRENTLY ON DISPLAY

J K Rowling
by Stuart Pearson Wright, 2005

Sandy Nairne, Director of the National Portrait Gallery, says:
"This is a captivating portrait with more than a touch of magic. J K Rowling is delightfully portrayed by Stuart Pearson Wright with delicacy and charm"

Des Violaris, Director, UK Arts and Culture, BP, says:
"The commission of a portrait by the Trustees of the National Portrait Gallery is an integral and important part of the BP Portrait Award. Stuart's fascinating portrait of J K Rowling is a superb example."

The whole-length work by 2001 BP Portrait Award winner Stuart Pearson Wright shows the Harry Potter writer sitting at a table with a notepad and a plate of boiled eggs suggesting the café table setting where the author wrote her first novel and where she occasionally still writes.

Barefoot on a plain wooden floor in a room empty but for an aloe vera plant, light switch and radiator, Rowling is seen in a white dress beneath a window in front of an illuminated painted sky. Through a compressed and disconcerting distortion of space, the portrait suggests a passage of time and illusion with echoes of Alice in Wonderland and the parallel world created in the Potter stories.

The portrait alludes to Rowling's life as both a mother and a writer who has made an enormous impact on children's imagination worldwide. Three eggs seen in the composition are a reference to each of Rowling's children. In creating a three-dimensional setting, the artist has been influenced by eighteenth-century toy theatres, the boxes of Joseph Cornell and the early drawings of David Hockney. The portrait was begun early in 2004, when Wright made a number of visits to the writer's Scottish home. The artist observed and made sketches, sometimes while the writer was at work, and took photographs for reference. Wright says: "It felt like being a kind of director bringing together a set design, actors and props and then lighting the whole thing."

The work has been made possible by the BP Portrait Award sponsorship in which the first prize winner each year is commissioned as part of their prize to paint a portrait which is then presented to the National Portrait Gallery Trustees for selection.

Links
- J K Rowling's official website
- Stuart Pearson Wright's official website
- Portraits of J K Rowling in the NPG collections
- Portraits by Stuart Pearson Wright in the NPG collection

Go to a large print, text-only version of this site

All images and text are subject to copyright protection. 13 October 2008