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The Royal she

Traversing paint and pixels, Inga Walton examines portraits of select women in Tudors to Windsors: British Royal Portraits.

Portrait story

Photographer Polly Borland on capturing Queen Elizabeth II.

The Changing Face of the Scientist

Scientists tend to conjure up images of men in white coats in labs but this is just one stereotype in an evolving history of how we have perceived scientists, and how their profession has been understood over the years.

Imagination

Dr Sarah Engledow tells the story of The Queen’s Diamond Jubilee portrait by Australian artist Ralph Heimans.

Myself and Eye

Magda Keaney speaks with Lewis Morley about his photographic career and the major retrospective of his work on display at the NPG.

Little treasures

The acquisition of the ivory miniatures of Mortimer and Mrs Lewis.

Good, bad and the ugly

Michael Desmond explores what makes a portrait subject significant.

Painting writing

Dr Sarah Engledow explores the portraits of writers held in the National Portrait Gallery's collection.

Portrait 7

This issue of Portrait Magazine features Grace Cossington Smith, the Fairfax portrait gift and Lewis Morley's photographs.

Dr Who?

It is not well known that the person who composed the famous theme music for the BBC's Doctor Who series was Australian Ron Grainer.

Nocturnal animals

Joanna Gilmour explores the enticing urban shadows cast by artists Martin Lewis and Edward Hopper.

Golden Jubilee

Polly Borland's photograph of The Queen was commissioned by Buckingham Palace as part of a series of high profile celebrations to mark the Golden Jubilee.

Birds of a feather

Charting a path from cockatiel to finch, Annette Twyman explores her family portraits and stories.

Sure thing

Blue Mountain, Owner, Trainer, Jockey, James Scobie 1887 by Frederick Woodhouse Snr. is a portrait of James Scobie, well known jockey and eminent horse trainer.

Be bold

The name of Florence Broadhurst, one of Australia’s most significant wallpaper and textile designers, is now firmly cemented in the canon of Australian art and design.

The first nurse

Tamsin Hong recounts the tale of Marion Smith, the only known Australian Indigenous servicewoman of World War One.

Portrait 65

Hugh Ramsay, the fashion of Jenny Kee and Linda Jackson, Peter Wegner's centenarian series, John and Elizabeth Gould's family connections, Karen Quinlan's top five portraits and more.

Australian Princess

The full-length portrait of HRH Crown Princess Mary of Denmark by artist Jiawei Shen, has become a destination piece for visitors.

Duty bound

Joanna Gilmour explores the life of colonial women Lady Ellen Stirling, Eliza Darling, Lady Eliza Arthur, Elizabeth Macquarie and Lady Jane Franklin.

Portrait 67

William Yang on his autobiographical self portraits, David Parker's 1970s and 80s Melbourne music photographs, seven-time NPPP finalist Chris Budgeon, and Benjamin Warlngundu Ellis.

My Favourite Australian

The Australian public was invited in 2008 to vote for their favourite Australian.  After the votes were tallied an exhibition of the top-ten Popular Australians and the top-twenty unsung heroes was displayed at the National Portrait Gallery.

Icons and imagery

Alison Weir explores the National Portrait Gallery, London and the BP Portrait Award to find what makes a good painted portrait - past and present.

The Story So Far...

A reflection on the National Portrait Gallery's first four years.

Reflections on a Hologram

Sam Bowker examines Paula Dawson's Mirror, Mirror - a holographic portrait of Graeme Murphy.

Michael Kimmelman

Michael Kimmelman, Chief Art Critic of The New York Times and author of Portraits: Talking with Artists at the Met, the Modern, the Louvre and Elsewhere, presented the National Portrait Gallery Third Anniversary Lecture on 2 March 2002. He was generously brought to Australia by the Gordon Darling Foundation and Qantas.

Risky business

John Zubrzycki lauds the characters of the Australian escapology trade.

Starry knight

Aircraft designer, pilot and entrepreneur, Sir Lawrence Wackett rejoins friends and colleagues on the walls of the National Portrait Gallery.

In the galleries

Christopher Chapman highlights the inaugural hang of the new National Portrait Gallery building which opened in December 2008.

Face the music

Drawn from the Gallery's collection, the exhibition Face the Music explores the remarkable talents and achievements of Australian musicians, composers, conductors and celebrities associated with the music industry.

An Australian story

In his speech launching the new National Portrait Gallery building on 3 December 2008, then Prime Minister Kevin Rudd set the Gallery in a national and historical context.

The house, the horse, the wife and the offspring

Joanna Gilmour writes about the portraiture of the colonial artist William Nicholas.

The Saint and the merchant

Emanuel Solomon gave shelter to the Sisters of St Joseph upon the excommunication of St Mary MacKillop.

More cash than dash

Joanna Gilmour describes how colonial portraitists found the perfect market among social status seeking Sydneysiders.

Seduce and Destroy

Magda Keaney explores the symbolism in eX de Medici's portrait of Midnight Oil.

The bright-eyed Mariner

Hope for kindness

Sarah Engledow arrives at the junction of fate and hope in Sarah Ball’s poignant Immigrants series.

No shirt, no service

Bon Scott and Angus Young photographed by Rennie Ellis are part of a display celebrating summer and images of the shirtless male.

A quiet moment

As Bryan Westwood’s portrait of Brian Dunlop hangs adjacent to Brian Dunlop’s portrait of the philanthropist Dr Joseph Brown AO OBE, we see the artist of one work as the subject of the other. 

Little women

Joanna Gilmour looks beyond the ivory face of select portrait miniatures to reveal their sitters’ true grit.

Crikey!

Robin Sellick captured a rare moment of quietude from the late conservation star Steve Irwin.

No Laughing Matter

The biographical exhibition of Barry Humphries was the first display of its kind at the National Portrait Gallery.

Around the grounds

Anne Sanders writes about the exhibitions Victoria & Albert: Art & Love on display at the Queen's Gallery, Buckingham Palace and the retrospective of Sir Thomas Lawrence at the National Portrait Gallery, London.

Extremely generous and incredibly close

Michael Desmond examines the daguerreotype portraits created by American artist Chuck Close.

Spikes: then and now

As part of its ongoing program of commissions of portraits of prominent Australians, the National Portrait Gallery has unveiled a portrait of Her Excellency Marjorie Jackson-Nelson by South Australian artist Avril Thomas.

Material culture

The Rajah Quilt’s narrative promptings are as intriguing as the textile is intricate.

Blue Collar Icon

Dr Sarah Engledow delves into the life of union leader Pat Mackie who is depicted in a portrait by Nancy Borlase AM.

Profile of a marriage

Dr Sarah Engledow explores the lives of Sir George Grey and his wife Eliza, the subjects of a pair of wax medallions in the National Portrait Gallery's collection.

Tracks in the sand

Dr Sarah Engledow discusses Quentin Jones's photograph of Australian author Tim Winton.

Australia’s great internationalists

Penelope Grist explores the United Nations stories in the Gallery’s collection.

Mrs Cameron and the V&A

In March 2003 Magda Keaney travelled to London to join the photography section of the Victoria & Albert Museum for three months.

Giving and getting

The exhibition Portraits for Posterity celebrates gifts to the Gallery, of purchases made with donated funds, and testifies to the generosity and community spirit of Australians.

Big shots

Djon Mundine OAM brings poignant memory and context to Martin van der Wal’s 1986 portrait photographs of storied Aboriginal artists.

Less than six degrees of separation

Anne Sanders finds connections in Inner Worlds between Hungarian expatriates and the development of psychoanalysis in Australia.

Glossy too

The Glossy 2 exhibition highlights the integral role magazine photography plays in illustrating and shaping our contemporary culture.

Empire records

Celebrates the centenary of the first national art collection, the Historic Memorials Collection, housed at Australia's Parliament House.

Why do painted portraits still matter?

Lecture by Sandy Nairne, Director, National Portrait Gallery, London, given at the National Portrait Gallery, Canberra on 28 April 2006.

The intellectual larrikin

Barrie Cassidy pays textured tribute to the inimitable Bob Hawke.

Depth of Field

The exhibition Depth of Field displays a selection of portrait photographs that reflect the strength and diversity of Australian achievement.

Give me five

National Portrait Gallery director Karen Quinlan AM nominates her quintet of favourites from the collection, with early twentieth-century ‘selfies’ filling the roster.

Expect the unexpected

Joanna Gilmour revels in accidental artist Charles Rodius’ nineteenth century renderings of Indigenous peoples.

Bill and Ted's excellent portrait.

Sarah Engledow on Messrs Dobell and MacMahon and the art of friendship.

Take thy face hence

Joanna Gilmour travels through time to explore the National Portrait Gallery London’s masterpieces in Shakespeare to Winehouse.

Citizen Kenne

April Thompson explores an exhibition of Ingvar Kenne’s global portrait project.

Meeting by Murder

The story behind two colonial portraits; a lithograph of captain and convict John Knatchbull and newspaper illustration of Robert Lowe, Viscount Sherbrooke.

Food for thought

Michael Wardell on Chrys Zantis’ Ora.

You beauty

Joanna Gilmour explores the fact and fictions surrounding the legendary life of Irish-born dancer Lola Montez.

Star signs

Barry York charts the course from childhood request to autographed celebrity portrait anthology.

Anatomist's eye

Robert Hannaford has completed around 400 portraits over the span of his career. 

A real Pratt

The death of a gentlewoman is shrouded in mystery, a well-liked governor finds love after sorrow, and two upright men become entangled in the historical record.

The story of us

Gallery directors Karen Quinlan and Tony Ellwood talk to Penelope Grist about the NPG and NGV collaborative exhibition, Who Are You: Australian Portraiture.

Aussies all

The exhibition Aussies all features the ecclectic portrait photography of Rennie Ellis which captures Australian life during the 70s and 80s.

Political profiles

Joanna Gilmour examines the prolific output of Charles Balthazar Julien Févret de Saint-Mémin, and discovers the risk of taking a portrait at face value.

Twin chics

Joanna Gilmour on the exuberant union of fashion pioneers Jenny Kee and Linda Jackson, captured in luminescent splendour by artist Carla Fletcher.

Prima facie

Sarah Engledow casts a judicious eye over portraits in the Victorian Bar’s Peter O’Callaghan QC Portrait Gallery.

The fat of the land

Sir Sidney Kidman (1857-1935) is inscribed in Australian legend as the ‘Cattle King’. 

Mother’s muse

Inga Walton traces the poignant path of photographer Polixeni Papapetrou, revealed in the NGV’s summer retrospective.

Listomania

Sarah Engledow describes the fall-out once Brett Whiteley stuck Patrick White’s list of his loves and hates onto his great portrait of the writer.

Vanity fair

Ashleigh Wadman rediscovers the Australian characters represented with a kindly touch by the British portrait artist Leslie Ward for the society magazine Vanity Fair.

Technical terminology

Michael Desmond introduces some of the ideas behind the exhibition Present Tense: An imagined grammar of portraiture in the digital age.

Study in scarlet

Angus Trumble reflects on the force of nature that was Helena Rubinstein.

Generous Janice

Dr Sarah Engledow puts four gifts to the National Portrait Gallery’s Collection in context.

Friends and Acquaintances

Dr. Sarah Engledow discusses a collection of drawings and prints by the Victorian artist Rick Amor acquired in 2005.

The activist A-list

Dr Sarah Engledow examines a number of figures in the collection of the National Portrait Gallery who were pioneers or substantial supporters of the seminal Australian environmental campaigns of the early 1970s and 1980s.

Petal to the mettle

Sarah Engledow lauds the very civil service of Dame Helen Blaxland.

Eating the seasons

Anne Sanders imbibes Tony Bilson’s gastronomic revolution.

Confessional conversations

Fiona Gruber investigates the work of Australian painter Kristin Headlam.

Lauded legacy

Karl James gives short shrift to doubts about the profile of General Sir John Monash.

Earth to earth

Dr Sarah Engledow discusses the recent gift of works by David Campbell.

Cultural kaleidoscope

The complex connections between four creative Australians; Patrick White, Sidney Nolan, Robert Helpmann and Peter Sculthorpe.

Presence and absence

The art of Australia’s colonial women painters affords us an invaluable, alternative perspective on the nascent nation-building project.

An actress and her fans

Dr. Sarah Engledow discovers the amazing life of Ms. Hilda Spong, little remembered star of the stage, who was captured in a portrait by Tom Roberts.

Unknown drawer

Dempsey’s People curator David Hansen chronicles a research tale replete with serendipity, adventure and Tasmanian tigers.

Queen of cartes

Joanna Gilmour discusses the role of the carte de visite in portraiture’s democratisation, and its harnessing by Victoria, the world’s first media monarch.

Secure the shadow ere the substance fade

The tragic tale of Tom Wills, the ‘inventor’ of Australian Rules Football.

All the way with K of K

Sarah Engledow bristles at the biographers’ neglect of Kitchener’s antipodean intervention.