Category Archives: National Portrait Gallery

Masterpieces and margaritas: National Portrait Gallery to open new bar as part of revamp

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London gallery will be latest institution to offer after-hours events when it reopens in June after a £35m refurbishment

If gazing at paintings in the hushed surroundings of an art gallery isn’t your thing, perhaps cocktails, live DJ sets and quirky fashion shows are. In which case, head straight to that art gallery.

This week the National Portrait Gallery (NPG) in central London announced that when it reopens in June after a £35m refurbishment, a new bar will serve cocktails and small plates long after its display areas have closed.

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Photos of lockdown mundanity win £15,000 Taylor Wessing prize

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Judges commend Clémentine Schneidermann for simple series capturing neighbour in Wales

A series of portraits documenting the mundane, daily chores of life in lockdown have won one of the world’s most prestigious photography prizes.

The National Portrait Gallery has named French photographer Clémentine Schneidermann as winner of the 2022 Taylor Wessing photographic portrait prize for her series Laundry Day. The photographer, who lives and works between Paris and south Wales, wins £15,000.

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London’s National Gallery under pressure over links to Credit Suisse

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Questions raised over sponsorship of exhibitions by scandal-hit Swiss bank

The National Gallery’s partnership with Credit Suisse has been thrown into question after leaked documents revealed the hidden wealth of the bank’s criminal clients, including drug traffickers, money launderers and corrupt politicians.

Credit Suisse, headquartered in Zurich, has sponsored the National Gallery since 2008 in one of the UK’s biggest arts funding deals. The partnership, renewed in 2020 and due to run until at least 2024, means Credit Suisse’s name is linked to exhibitions for artists from Raphael and Monet to Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci.

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Nan Goldin threatens London gallery boycott over £1m gift from Sackler fund

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Artist brands planned donation from pharmaceutical family to National Portrait Gallery unethical over OxyContin link

The National Portrait Gallery will be forced to turn down a gift of £1m from members of the multibillionaire Sackler family if it goes ahead with a prestigious new exhibition of the work of US artist Nan Goldin.

The photographer and activist is threatening to boycott the gallery if it accepts the donation from the owners of the American pharmaceutical company that makes the addictive painkiller OxyContin, the Observer has learned.

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