Queen Elizabeth II adds more portraits of herself to an already huge collection
And the queen portraits just keep coming.
Long-serving Queen Elizabeth II, surely one of the most photographed and portrait-painted individuals in history, unveiled another new portrait to add to an already out-sized collection on Friday in the Oak Room at Windsor Castle.
Accompanied by military artist Stuart Brown, the 92-year-old queen, wearing a white dress and pearls, entered the room to inspect Brown’s large portrait depicting her seated at a desk in the castle’s White Drawing Room, wearing a blue dress and pearls.
On her left shoulder she is wearing a martial brooch featuring the Astral Crown and crossed Lee Enfield rifles that was presented to her by the Royal Air Force Regiment.
Brown was commissioned to paint Britain’s longest-reigning monarch (66 years and counting) by the RAF Regiment to celebrate its 75th anniversary and to honor the queen who is the Air Commodore in Chief.
The painting is to be displayed at an RAF base in Suffolk that is home to the regiment and also the RAF Police.
This latest portrait was presented a day after another, even more majestic-looking portrait of the queen was released by the British Royal Collection.ÂÂ
This one, by painter Nicky Philipps, depicts the queen wearing the grand, dark green velvet ceremonial robe and collar of the Order of the Thistle, Scotland’s prestigious order of chivalry. The monarch heads these orders and controls their memberships.
That painting was placed in the Royal Dining Room at Holyrood House in Edinburgh, the official royal residence of the monarch in Scotland.ÂÂ
The most recent Thistle Service, where the queen wears the robe plus an elaborate hat with huge white feathers, took place at St Giles Cathedral on July 6, 2018 in Edinburgh.
And there’s yet another new portrait of the queen to admire, this one also with an RAF link. In October, during a visit to the RAF Club in London, she got a close up look of a portrait by artist Ben Sullivan commissioned by the club to mark its centenary.
She is wearing another pale blue dress and pearls and also is seated in the White Drawing Room at Windsor Castle. But this time the artist included a detail rarely seen in her portraits even though she is rarely seen without one on her arm: Her black Launer handbag is on the floor at her feet. ÂÂ
The queen turns up not just in paintings and photographs but also in sculpture. The latest piece, by London-based Italian artist Matt Marga, is called “One Million Queen” and was originally produced for the queen’s birthday in April.ÂÂ
It depicts the queen’s iconic profile (familiar from currency) on Park Lane in Hyde Park in London, and it’s made of about 1 million crystals embedded in a clear glass sheet.
It also contains 53 real diamonds representing the countries that make up the Commonwealth, the organization the queen heads and has built during her years on the throne from the eight nations it started with to the 53 included today.
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Queen Elizabeth II overtakes her great great-grandmother Queen Victoria as Britain’s longest reigning monarch, at just over 63 years, on Wednesday. At 89, hers is the most famous, most photographed, most painted face in the world. She’s on the money, on the stamps, and on many, many official portraits, more than 130 painted portraits alone over her reign, according to Buckingham Palace. The British National Portrait Gallery in London has more than 900 images of her at last count. Take a look at some of her portraits, starting with “warts and all-style” depiction by royal portrait painter Richard Stone. This 1980 artwork makes no attempt to hide her wrinkles, furrowed brow and graying temples.This was probably her first picture, at her christening, in May 1926, as Princess Elizabeth Alexandra Mary of York. With her in the private chapel of Buckingham Palace are, left to right: (aunt) Lady Elphinstone, (uncle) Duke of Connaught, (grandmother) Queen Mary, (grandfather) King George V, (mother) Duchess of York and baby, (father) Duke of York, (maternal grandmother) Countess of Strathmore, (maternal grandfather) Earl of Strathmore and (aunt) Princess Mary the Viscountess Lascelles.
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