News and events archive

	Peg Woffington (?1720-1760), actress, as Phebe by Peter van Bleeck, mezzotint, 1747
	© National Portrait Gallery, London

The School has announced two new courses taking place soon: Eighteenth Century Women’s Underpinnings: the cut and construction of stays and hooped petticoats (26-30 March), and An Introduction to the Study of Historical Dress c.1500 - 1900 (31 March-1 April). Both are very practical, and student numbers are limited so book early!
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	Queen Elizabeth II, possibly by Charles James Dawson, for Central Press, printed and published by Raphael Tuck & Sons colour postcard print, 4 November 1952 (detail).
	© National Portrait Gallery, London

This exhibition celebrates Her Majesty’s 60 years as Sovereign, from the early years of her reign in the 1950s to the present day, through a wide-ranging selection of images, illustrating both key events in her remarkable life and more informal family occasions.
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	Richard Hillary by Eric Henri Kennington, pastel, 1942. On loan to the exhibition, 'The Face of Courage: Eric Kennington, Portraiture and the Second World War'.
	© National Portrait Gallery, London

Portraits of the British at War, 1940-45, by Eric Kennington (1888-1960). For much of his distinguished career, Kennington was regularly classed by leading critics as belonging to the ranks of such exceptional portraitists as Hans Holbein the Younger, Albrecht Dürer, Franz Hals, Van Gogh and Augustus John. Furthermore, many of his artistic contemporaries rated him as one of the finest draughtsman of his day. This exhibition, the first to focus specifically on his Second World War Art, seeks to reassess Kennington’s significant contribution to British War Art and to acknowledge his undoubted standing as one of the great British portraitists of the Twentieth Century. In a ‘People’s War’ he produced unforgettable images of ordinary men and women who displayed extraordinary courage and resource.
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	Mrs Salesbury with her Grandchildren Edward and Elizabeth Bagot by John Michael Wright, 1675-6
	© Tate, 2011

This ambitious touring exhibition shows how the subject of the family has been and continues to be a challenging yet enduring subject for artists. Divided thematically, the exhibition showcases the best of British art with works by David Hockney, Anthony van Dyck, William Hogarth and Tracey Emin. Contemporary and historic works are juxtaposed to show how the traditional family portrait has been joined by more frank portrayals of the family.

Later venues:
Laing Art Gallery Newcastle 21 May – 2 September 2012
Tate Britain 1 October – 21 December 2012
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	The Royal Family by Philip Bevan, 1977, screenprint
	© the artist

This exhibition decodes the representation of monarchy and monarchs through their portraits, considers the political and social context of the times in which they were made, and explores Chester’s long relationship with the Crown.
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	Lucian Freud My Father by Jane McAdam Freud
	© Jane McAdam Freud

Artist Jane McAdam Freud presents a large scale sculpture portraying her father Lucian Freud. It will be exhibited for the first time in London’s Freud Museum – once home to her great grandfather, Sigmund Freud. Jane spent many hours with her father in the months before his death in July 2011 making sketches for this new work. It will be shown at the Freud Museum alongside other smaller scale work and preparatory sketches.
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	Self-portrait by Edward Gibson (1668-1701), chalk, 1690 or 1696
	© National Portrait Gallery, London

Histories of British Art is the third and final conference organised as part Court, Country, City: British Art, 1660-1735, a major research project run by the University of York and Tate Britain, and funded by the AHRC. We welcome proposals for 25-minute papers on any aspect of British Art, 1660-1735. A number of bursaries will be available to graduate student speakers.
Further details

The Institute of Historical Research and the Wallace Collection welcome paper for their joint workshop in July 2012. Further detail below.

Workshop on Approaches to the Study of Collecting, 6-7 July 2012 (pdf)

	Jeanie Wilson, fisherwoman, by David Octavius Hill, and Robert Adamson, calotype, 1843-1848
	© National Portrait Gallery, London

From the collections at the V&A and Royal Anthropological Institute to those at local libraries and in the professional archives of Magnum Photos, London is host to a surprising variety of often unknown photographic collections and archives, all of which are kept for different purposes. Using practical explorations, a variety of classroom and site visits with thematic discussions, this course considers the histories, preservation, use and related issues involved in these fascinating collections. Organised and led by the Photographer's Gallery with Birkbeck College.
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Sue Stern examines a portrait by an unidentified Worcester artist now at Hanbury Hall. In the National Trust Arts, Buildings & Collections Bulletin April 2011.
Here

Derek Holdaway at the National Trust explores a miniature of Richmond Thackeray (1781-1816), probably executed by George Chinnery in India.
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	Sir George Scharf, artist and art historian, by Walter William Ouless, 1885
	© National Portrait Gallery, London

An archivist at the National Portrait Gallery has found relics from the tomb of King Richard II while cataloguing the papers of its first Director Sir George Scharf (1820-1895). Among the hundreds of diaries and notebooks left behind in boxes not opened for years were contents from the coffin of a medieval English king, and sketches of his skull and bones. The contents of a cigarette box dated 31 August 1871 were only identified as relics from a royal tomb following cataloguing, when it became possible to cross-reference the date on the front of the box with diary entries and sketches made on the same day. The box contained fragments of wood, possibly from the coffin itself, and some fabric. Records from this date reveal that Scharf was present at an opening of the royal graves at Westminster Abbey. A piece of leather corresponds particularly with Scharf’s sketch of a glove contained in the coffin. A full account of the event was recorded by the Very Reverend Arthur Stanley, Dean of Westminster and published in Archaeologia in 1879.
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This paper discusses the painting of the courtier and writer Sir William Killigrew and the companion portrait of his wife Mary Hill, Lady Killigrew, both painted in 1638, by Sir Anthony van Dyck (1599–1641). The pair were acquired by Tate in 2002 and 2003 from two entirely different sources.
Article

The subject of this paper is a portrait of the celebrated eighteenth-century dancer, Auguste Vestris, acquired by Tate in 1955, when it was attributed to Gainsborough Dupont, nephew of Thomas Gainsborough. The paper argues that the portrait is in fact by Gainsborough himself and, through a discussion of the context in which it was made, sheds new light on Gainsborough's close relations with the world of the London stage.
Article

Link to blog

	Portrait of Colonel French during conservation by Ronald Moore
	© 1st The Queen's Dragoon Guards/Ronald Moore

Details of portrait conservation projects by Ronald Moore.
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	John Singleton Copley, painter, by Gilbert Stuart, 1783-1784
	© National Portrait Gallery, London

The National Trust publishes initial research into the working techniques of the portraitist Gilbert Stuart, based on a study of his works at Saltram House.
See the NT's Arts Buildings Collections bulletin October 2011

In 2000, the Royal Society of Portrait Painters mounted a millennial exhibition entitled People’s Portraits. The idea was to represent ordinary people from all walks of life, and thereby offer a picture of the United Kingdom as it moved from the 20th century into the 21st. The resulting collection is rich in the diversity of its subjects. The artists are all members of the Royal Society of Portrait Painters, and include Daphne Todd, June Mendoza and Jeff Stultiens, among others. This exciting and original collection has now come to Girton College as a long-term loan. The concept of this exhibition chimes well with the College ethos of community and interest in art. Additionally, the College serves as a picturesque setting for the paintings. There are currently 32 paintings in the exhibition, and an area of the College has been transformed into a special exhibition space.
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	Pressed horn box bearing portrait of Charles I by John Obrisset (1705-1728).
	© From the collection of the Worshipful Company of Horners

The Museum of Design in Plastics has Esmée Fairbairn Effective Collections funding to lend small groups of artefacts made of horn, a natural plastic. By displaying them in different contexts, it hopes to bring the art and craft of the horner to the attention of people who have not previously considered horn in such a context. So how can horn be relevant to portraiture?

The Museum has a dozen tobacco boxes embellished with portraits representing historical figures including Peter the Great, Charles I, James II, Queen Anne, Shakespeare and Handel (on the same box), and Robert Burns, dating from the early 18th to the early 19th centuries. Several are signed by John Obrisset . You can see them all on the Museum's website  here. Can you see a role for them in your displays? If so, please get in touch with Susan Lambert (slambert'at'aucb.ac.uk). The Museum will do all or as much of the work as possible, and there are no loan charges.

The National Trust has purchased a whole length portrait believed to depict Vere Egerton, who married William Booth of Dunham in 1619. The painting is attributed to Robert Peake (c1551-1619). See the National Trust's blog entry on the acquisition here, and a zoomable image on the Sotheby's site here.

Derek Holdaway, Volunteer Assistant at the National Trust, reveals a group of eight nineteenth-century miniatures at Lanhydrock to be the work of the talented Dowling family of Cheltenham.
see the NT's Arts Buildings Collections bulletin October 2011

	Conrad Ackner and Hazel Lavery, by Sir John Lavery, 1929
	© BDA Dental Museum

The painting will be a key exhibit in the museum's home on Wimpole Street, London. It is thought to be one of the only accurate depictions of an early 20th century dental surgery in action, featuring an early x-ray machine and headlamp.
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This British Postal Museum & Archive exhibition explores the evolution of Arnold Machin's classic profile portrait of the Queen
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	Gwen Yarker's tour of 'Georgian Faces'
	© DCM

A guided tour of the 2010/11 exhibition at Dorset County Museum, led by the exhibition curator Gwen Yarker.
Here

	Sir John Fielding, magistrate and social reformer, by Nathaniel Hone, 1762
	© National Portrait Gallery, London

Disability is no respecter of person. Those represented on the walls of the National Portrait Gallery and in its collections are among the most celebrated members of British society but among them are many with disabilities. Some are celebrated in literature: Richard III was famously depicted by Shakespeare as ‘Crookback’, while the poet Byron who had a foot disability, or ‘club-foot’, has been vilified as having ‘the face of an angel on a devil’s body’.
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Access a fantastic range of gallery talks, interviews with artists and lectures from the Smithsonian NPG on their Face-to-Face Podcasts page here.
Podcasts include
* Brandon Fortune, curator at NPG, discusses Mather Brown's portrait of Thomas Jefferson.
* Liz Rideal, of London's National Portrait Gallery, discusses John Singleton Copley's self-portrait.
* Photographer Alec Soth discusses his work.
* Sid Hart, senior historian at NPG, discusses a portrait of Martha Washington by Gilbert Stuart.
* Warren Perry, researcher at NPG, discusses Andy Warhol's portrait of Michael Jackson.

	'Facing Beauty' by Aileen Ribeiro
	© Yale University Press

Throughout the history of the Western world, countless attempts have been made to define beauty in art and life, especially with regard to women's bodies and faces. Facing Beauty examines concepts of female beauty in terms of the ideal and the real, investigating paradigms of beauty as represented in art and literature and how beauty has been enhanced by cosmetics and hairstyles.
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	The master model and its mould
	© National Conservation Centre, Liverpool

The National Conservation Centre produces plaster replicas of Michael Rysbrack’s bust of the architect James Gibbs (1682-1754)
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In advance of a display at the Royal Society on the life of the Roger Joseph Boscovich S.J. (1711-87), attempts are being made to locate a missing portrait of the Croatian polymath by Robert Edge Pine (1730-88). The organisers would also like to hear from anyone conducting research into Pine's career. Please follow this link for more details and a related image (pdf):
letter from The Art Newspaper, no. 217, October 2010
If you have any suggestions or queries please contact us as ssnportraiture@npg.org.uk

	Mary ('Patsy') Cornwallis-West (née Fitzpatrick), beauty and socialite, by W. & D. Downey, 1881 (detail)
	© National Portrait Gallery, London

This film features author Eleri Lynn as she leads us on a tour of a long hidden world. Eleri's brief history of shapewear starts with the hourglass and S-bend forms - and steel and whalebone engineering - of Victorian and Edwardian corsets carries on through the breast-flattening bandeau bras worn by 1920s flappers, the New Look underwear of Christian Dior, the conicle bullet bras of the 1950s and concludes with  the arrival of Lycra in the 1960s and the renaissance of corsetry through the new popularity of burlesque.
Here

On the V&A Channel here

Read detailed research into the picture's origins and provenance here.

unknownsitter.com is the collaborative project of artist Nicky Bird, art historian Lara Perry and five other contributors from a range of disciplines. Together, they explore the problem of unknown sitters, and the value of their portraits. They ask how different disciplinary approaches to the interpretation of such portraits might illuminate our understanding of portraits of unknown, and known, sitters.
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