{"id":11885,"date":"2018-04-05T12:47:37","date_gmt":"2018-04-05T12:47:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.britishportraits.org.uk\/?p=11885"},"modified":"2018-04-06T10:34:50","modified_gmt":"2018-04-06T10:34:50","slug":"understanding-british-portraits-annual-seminar-29-november-2017-by-dr-kate-bethune","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.britishportraits.org.uk\/blog\/understanding-british-portraits-annual-seminar-29-november-2017-by-dr-kate-bethune\/","title":{"rendered":"Understanding British Portraits Annual Seminar, 29 November 2017 by Dr Kate Bethune"},"content":{"rendered":"
The UBP Annual Seminar<\/a>, held at the National Portrait Gallery in November, was my first encounter with the network. They say first impressions count the most, and I certainly wasn\u2019t disappointed.<\/p>\n Having recently joined the National Trust as a Regional Curator with responsibility for all properties in Dorset, I am making it my priority to tap into as many specialist networks as possible in order to meet colleagues from a range of organisations and, in the case of portraiture, to grow my knowledge of a subject area and medium in which I don\u2019t have much prior experience. (Previously I worked in the Furniture, Textiles and Fashion department at the V&A, before working as the Director\u2019s Researcher for two years \u2013 so I\u2019ve had something of a leave of absence from collections and curatorial work and now find myself in an extremely broad role which spans many periods, disciplines and media).<\/p>\n The UBP annual seminar was enormously useful to me in this regard. While the wide range of papers piqued my curiosity to learn more about subjects as diverse as the underrepresentation of black people in visual culture to the significance of pets in Victorian family photo albums, I also benefitted greatly from hearing people speak in their many different capacities as curators and collections managers, researchers and writers, and learning and interpretation specialists. The specific insights and perspectives each speaker brought to their approach to reading, interpreting and presenting portraits gave me much to consider as I take my own work forward with the National Trust and think about the multiple audiences the organisation is trying to engage through displays that move, teach and inspire.<\/p>\n I really enjoyed the balance between fine art and photography that ran through the panels, and I took something away from every paper. Three, however, resonated particularly strongly with me: Dr Juliet Carey\u2019s opening paper on curating a display of Elizabethan portraits at Waddesdon Manor<\/a>, Ren\u00e9e Massai and Helen Whiteoak\u2019s paper on Black Chronicles<\/em><\/a>, part of which major programme was a partnership between Autograph ABP<\/a> in Shoreditch and the National Portrait Gallery, and Alice Cox\u2019s insights into co-curating Refracted<\/em> with volunteers at the Russell-Cotes in Bournemouth<\/a> (my new local museum).<\/p>\n Being relatively new to the National Trust, it was really useful to hear about the experience of curators working in other regions. I really appreciated Dr Carey\u2019s honesty regarding the diplomacy and level of compromise required of her in working in an historic house where the family are still actively engaged in its presentation. Accommodating Lord Rothschild\u2019s request to include Lucien Freud\u2019s portrait of Elizabeth II in a display whose focus lay more than 400 years earlier in the court of Elizabeth I at first seemed questionable. Had the display\u2019s integrity been compromised? Or was her acquiescence inspired? I found in favour of the latter, for direct relevance aside, the Freud gave visitors a contemporary point of reference which prompted consideration of the role portraits still play in supporting public images of royals. And it demonstrated the importance of finding contemporary currency with the work that we do if we are to successfully engage broad audiences.<\/p>\n