National Portrait Gallery - BP Portraits

I went to the National Portrait Gallery yesterday to see the 'Glamour of the Gods' exhibition of portraits of Hollywood stars. It was nice as far as it went, but it didn't inspire me. Some of the portraits were film stills (probably taken as promotional photos) and others were rather mundane portraits of stars that we've all seen better photos of. There were even two portraits of Joan Collins, neither of which were particularly inspiring (there are two better ones in the main collection). It's a relatively small exhibition and accompanied by a big book that's for sale. More interesting to me was the BP Portrait exhibition.

We visited this exhibition due to queues at the Hollywood exhibition and I quite enjoyed it. It's a mixed bag of styles and humanity and I suppose that's what makes it interesting. The first one that caught my eye was a portrait of Glenda Jackson, no holds barred on how she's aged. Glenda was never the prettiest of actresses but that wasn't the point - she was an actress and could act beautiful without being beautiful. And that makes her beautiful. She's been a Member of Parliament for years now and it's brave of her to sit for this warts and all portrait. Another one that caught my eye was the colourful portrait of Boy George in his usual B-Rude garb and with platform shoes. It's at an interesting angle but it's the use of colour that really drew my attention, almost metallic in feel.

I was also taken with the portrait of the woman prisoner in prison orange and handcuffed before being led away. I've no idea what the background to this painting is but the woman stares straight out at the viewer, no shame at all. As does the self-portrait of Fiona Scott in which she stares out of the painting at the viewer. I've no idea what she's asking for in this portrait - why is she holding a mug? It's not particularly dramatic but it caught my attention.

You can take a look at 50 of the portraits on the NPG website here. Go and see it if you can - it's free.