Picturing Friendship

Sweet exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery looking at portraits of friends across the ages.

 
The show talked about the reasons for these pictures as signs of friendship, as a proxy for a missing person and group pictures to establish identity.
 
The earliest pictures were a pair painted by Gerlache Flicke of himself and Harry Strangwish when they were in prison. Flicke’s picture is thought to be the first self-portrait in oils painted in England. A fun group picture was of Viscountess Melbourne,  Georgiana Duchess of Devonshire and Anne Seymour, a sculptress dressed as the three witches from Macbeth!
 
A couple of the photos came from a series by Julian Edelstein, a lovely one of French and Saunders and one of Colin Jackson and Linford Christie, head to head in a competitive pose but smiling.

My favourite work was the one as you go into the room of George Payne and Henry John Rouse, two Victorian gentlemen walking arm in arm. They were famous for their love of horseracing and this is a touching picture off friends enjoying each other’s company and a shared hobby.


 
Closes on 13 May 2019

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