Words and pictures

As the cheapest train fare that I could get back from London on Friday meant not leaving till 9pm, I found myself with a few hours to kill.

I decided to go to the National Portrait Gallery. It’s just over the road from the Garrick, where I saw A Little Night Music, and I’m getting quite familiar with this part of London. It’s bizarre that it’s taken me this long to feel I actually know my way round the centre a little. It was open until 9pm on Friday, and had a restaurant and a café, so that was me sorted.

I have been before, as it ticks the boxes of both history and art, but it was lovely to browse at my own pace, in an almost empty galley – I guess it’s not everyone’s idea of a good Friday night out. The quiet adds an eerie quality as I look into these faces of people long dead, and many of the paintings have a resonance which is lost in photographic reproductions. The great and the good are grouped by period. I’m struck by how real many of them seem; they’ve been captured warts and all, quite literally in the case of Oliver Cromwell. A notable exception is the Prince Regent; the aging and hugely fat ‘Prinny’ is presented as dashing and heroic. The earliest portraits are from the 15th century. Richard III is there is all his glory, with added deformities visible. So is Henry Tudor, who looks mean and miserable.

There’s a feature on Henry VIII which is fascinating. He’s there as a young man of 30, and as the fat and aging monarch. Even the artists fearing for their heads don’t flatter him. In the Elizabethan Gallery, a group are playing contemporary music, but it means I can’t get up close to the portraits, so I skip ahead to Shakespeare. Authentic or not, there’s something in his eyes which speaks to me. There’s laughter and intelligence in this face, along with some self mockery.

I love the Stuart portraits, Charles II, and his mistresses, Prince Rupert, dashing and handsome. Of the later periods, the Romantics fascinate. Byron is stylish and heroic, in costume, and many of the men look like they could have modelled for Mr Darcy. Jane herself is there, in a tiny miniature painted by her sister.

The Victorian portraits are different again. A celebration of British industry and achievement, these are self made men, soldiers and men of Empire. Gladstone and Disraeli seem to glare balefully at each other as they must have done over the despatch box, while Queen Victoria gazes adoringly at Prince Albert.

Once we get to the 20thC, the style becomes more abstract. Some are too ‘modern’ for me, but others seem to capture the spirit of the sitter. I particularly like one of Alan Bennett, who looks a little shambolic clutching a coffee mug.

It was a lovely little oasis, away from both work, and the hustle and bustle of a Friday evening in London. Just perfect.