Lucien Freud portraits : the making of an exhibition

Fantastic lecture at the National Portrait Gallery given by co-curator of the current Lucien Freud exhibition, Sarah Howgate.

This was a fascinating look at how an exhibition is put together from the moment this idea was muted to the prospect of 225,000 visitors in total. It was very interesting to hear about the mechanics of how the pictures have to be delivered to the gallery in an particular order and how many of them had to be unpacked and hung in front of the couriers who had brought them.

It was interesting to hear her talk about regular lunches with the artist and the effect his death during the process had on the final exhibition.

I loved the fact that some people wouldn’t lend their pictures because they couldn’t bare to be without them for the year.

A real tribute to Sarah was how the questions flowed at the end. She had a very real and approachable style which put people at ease and made them feel they could ask more.

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