The Understanding British Portraits Podcast

In this episode Ruth Millington speaks to two individuals who reshaped the meaning of the word muse: Sue Tilley shares her experience as Lucian Freud’s model, and Morag Caister gives a personal insight into the gendered dynamics between artist and sitter with reference to her Sky Arts’ “Portrait Artist of the Year” competition-winning portrait of Lenny Henry, now in the National Portrait Gallery’s collection.

There have been calls by some critics and feminist art historians to cancel the word muse. But, can we instead successfully reclaim this term? What would this look like in practice? How should museums and galleries recognise the real-life individuals framed in their masterpieces through interpretation? In what ways should contemporary artists give credit to their muses? With increasing conversations about the abusive behaviour of great male artists, can we separate artist (and muse) from artwork?

Host: Ruth Millington
Ruth Millington is a Birmingham-based art consultant and curator with extensive experience of developing exhibitions, managing artists and their estates, advising on the acquisition and commissioning of artworks, and writing about culture.
She is the author of MUSE (Penguin, 2022) which uncovers the true stories of 30 muses, from Dora Maar and Elizabeth Siddal to George Dyer and Peter Schlesinger. Ruth’s first children’s book, This Book Will Make You An Artist (Nosy Crow, 2023), invites children to take creative inspiration from great artists of the past.

Ruth writes about the visual arts for publications including TIME, The Independent, The Telegraph, Dazed and Art UK. She has also been featured on TV and radio including Sky Arts, the BBC, C4, ITV and TRT World. Most recently, she presented a documentary on the radical history of collage art, ‘Painting with Scissors', for BBC R4.

Sue Tilley is an author, artist, presenter and artist’s model. She is famous for having sat for Lucian Freud over a period of nine months for four paintings and two etchings. She was also the muse and friend of the late fashion designer and performance artist Leigh Bowery and worked as the cashier for his notorious nightclub Taboo.

The National Portrait Gallery exhibition Lucian Freud: Drawing into Painting runs from 12 February to 4 May 2026. Details are here.

To find out more about Lucian Freud’s portrait of Sue Tilley, Benefits Supervisor Resting (1994), visit the BBC Culture website, here.

Morag Caister is a British artist represented by London based gallery RHODES. Caister’s practice functions as a space in which less coherent aspects of the self can be met. By attending to what is unclear or contradictory within herself, the artist opens a broader consideration of what we are like as people.
The Understanding British Portraits Podcast is a series that explores current ideas and debates around the power of portraiture. The series investigates who gets to be depicted in portraiture, how we should display and talk about portraiture and how portraits can help us tell the stories of people underrepresented in the arts. The episodes are curated and presented by guest hosts who come from a wide range of backgrounds in the art history, heritage and museum worlds.
Visit https://britishportraits.org/resources/podcast to find out more.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Ruth Millington explores the history British portraits from the perspective of the artist’s muse, with particular focus on portraits created by the Pre-Raphaelite brotherhood. Speaking to Art and Literature historian, researcher, writer and freelance curator, Hannah Squire, this episode delves into the relationships that models have held with the artists who immortalised them, exposes the influential and active part models have played and deconstructs reductive stereotypes, reframing the muse as a momentous and empowered agent of art history.

Host: Ruth Millington
Ruth Millington is a Birmingham-based art consultant and curator with extensive experience of developing exhibitions, managing artists and their estates, advising on the acquisition and commissioning of artworks, and writing about culture.
She is the author of MUSE (Penguin, 2022) which uncovers the true stories of 30 muses, from Dora Maar and Elizabeth Siddal to George Dyer and Peter Schlesinger. Ruth’s first children’s book, This Book Will Make You An Artist (Nosy Crow, 2023), invites children to take creative inspiration from great artists of the past.

Ruth writes about the visual arts for publications including TIME, The Independent, The Telegraph, Dazed and Art UK. She has also been featured on TV and radio including Sky Arts, the BBC, C4, ITV and TRT World. Most recently, she presented a documentary on the radical history of collage art, ‘Painting with Scissors', for BBC R4.

Hannah Squire is an Art and Literature historian, researcher, writer and freelance curator. Hannah previously worked as an Assistant Curator National Public Programmes at the National Trust, working on national campaigns to create curatorial content focused on inclusive histories. Before this she worked at Wightwick Manor for over three years, where she led the 2018 Women and Power progamming and the 2017 Prejudice and Pride programming exploring the work of female and queer artists stories in connection with the Manor. As part of this programming, she curated the second only solo exhibition of Elizabeth Eleanor Siddal’s art and poetry, Beyond Ophelia, in 2018 and in 2019 co-curated the Look Beneath the Lustre exhibition of Evelyn and William De Morgan’s work, which you can still visit at Wightwick. Hannah also co-hosts the Pre-Raphaelite Society podcast, and co-leads on the Society’s social media, as well as contributing to its journal. Hannah is co-curator of the exhibition The Rossettis: Siblings and Spouses on display at Wightwick Manor from 7 March to 8 November 2026.
The Understanding British Portraits Podcast is a series that explores current ideas and debates around the power of portraiture. The series investigates who gets to be depicted in portraiture, how we should display and talk about portraiture and how portraits can help us tell the stories of people underrepresented in the arts. The episodes are curated and presented by guest hosts who come from a wide range of backgrounds in the art history, heritage and museum worlds.
Visit https://britishportraits.org/resources/podcast to find out more.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This episode focuses on how we commission portraits today, drawing on Tanya Bentley's experience, in her role as Contemporary Curator of the National Portrait Gallery.

The commissioning programme at the National Portrait Gallery began in 1980, the year British artist Bryan Organ was commissioned to produce the iconic portrait of the Prince of Wales (later King Charles III) and then, in 1981, a portrait of Diana, Princess of Wales. This episode provides the unprecedented opportunity to hear from Organ directly about his experience of capturing these images of the British Royal Family to be immortalised for all time in the national portrait collection.

Next, Tanya’s interview with artist Nina Mae Fowler touches on Fowler’s own experience of being commissioned by the National Portrait Gallery to make a series of drawings of British film directors (2019). The conversation also reflects on the importance and potential challenges of commissioning programmes such as the NPG’s to make positive changes that will go some way to redressing imbalances in our art collections.

Host: Tanya Bentley
Tanya is Contemporary Curator at the National Portrait Gallery, London. She works with the Senior Curator of Contemporary Collections to look after the Gallery’s large collection of contemporary portraits (2000–now). Tanya researches the collection, makes acquisitions, commissions new portraits and curates exhibitions, temporary displays and gallery rehangs of contemporary portraiture at the NPG. Tanya curated a three-year rotating exhibition (2023-2026) of materials from the Lucian Freud Archive held at the NPG, including Freud’s sketchbooks, displayed in Room 26 as part of the permanent collection.

Bryan Organ is a leading painter of people, whose sitters include singers, scientists and sportsmen, although he is best known for his groundbreaking portraits of royalty. Having graduated from the Royal Academy in 1959, Organ taught at Loughborough College of Art from 1959 to 1966. Since then, he has worked as a full-time artist. At a 1969 solo exhibition at the Redfern Gallery, his work attracted the interest of Princess Margaret, who promptly chose him to paint her portrait. When exhibited at the National Portrait Gallery, the piece caused a sensation. Many of his portraits can be found at the NPG, including: Dr Roy Strong, 1971; Lester Piggott, 1973; Harold Macmillan, 1980; HRH The Prince of Wales, 1981; Lady Diana Spencer, 1981; Jim Callaghan, 1983; HRH The Duke of Edinburgh, 1983. Other portraits include Sir Michael Tippett, 1966; Mary Quant, 1969; HRH The Princess Margaret, 1970; Elton John, 1973; President Mitterand, 1985; Richard Attenborough (later Lord Attenborough), 1985, 2003; and most recently, Sir David Attenborough, 2016. Bryan Organ is represented by the Redfern Gallery.

Nina Mae Fowler is a British artist whose works have been exhibited internationally, including frequent solo exhibitions in London, Paris and Berlin, and are held in public collections of international significance, including Oxford University and The National Portrait Gallery, London. Fowler has been shortlisted for numerous prestigious prizes and awards, including the Jerwood Drawing Prize (2015 & 2010), the Drawing Now Award (2014), and the BP Portrait Award (2008). Past commissions include portraits of biologist Professor Richard Dawkins and biographer Dame Hermione Lee. In 2024 Fowler’s portrait of Zimbabwean writer Dambudzo Marechera was commissioned by Balliol College Oxford. It is the first portrait of a person of colour to be hung in the main hall since the college was founded over 700 years ago. In 2019, Fowler was awarded a major commission for The National Portrait Gallery. The series, Luminary Drawings, comprises nine portraits of leading British Film Directors – including Sam Mendes, Ken Loach and Sally Potter – which are now part of NPG's permanent collection. A monograph of her work, Measuring Elvis, was published by Cob Gallery, London.
The Understanding British Portraits Podcast is a series that explores current ideas and debates around the power of portraiture. The series investigates who gets to be depicted in portraiture, how we should display and talk about portraiture and how portraits can help us tell the stories of people underrepresented in the arts. The episodes are curated and presented by guest hosts who come from a wide range of backgrounds in the art history, heritage and museum worlds.
Visit https://britishportraits.org/resources/podcast to find out more.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Tanya Bentley, Contemporary Curator at the National Portrait Gallery, chairs a lively discussion between acclaimed artists Charmaine Watkiss and Curtis Holder, to explore the connections between contemporary portrait drawing and visual storytelling. Watkiss and Holder discuss their drawing practise in relation to the theme of storytelling, and explore general trends in contemporary portrait drawing today.

Artists often use the simplest and most conventional tools for drawing, such as pencil and pen on paper, which are also the most common writing tools. More than any other medium, drawing tends to be more reactive, accessible, fluid and personal. These characteristics of drawing lend themselves to storytelling and the possibility of incorporating multiple narratives into a single work, including overlooked or misrepresented stories in history.

Guests:

Charmaine Watkiss is a British artist known for her works exploring the botanical legacy of the Caribbean and and tracking the lineage to Africa. Informed by detailed archival research, she reimagines the women through whom such knowledge of plants and their properties has been handed down. Watkiss uses her own likeness to tell these collectively experienced 'memory stories'.

A newly commissioned work by Watkiss currently features in Artists First: Contemporary Perspectives on Portraiture, on display at the National Portrait Gallery until 2 August 2026.

Curtis Holder is a London-based artist known for large-scale graphite and coloured pencil portraits and figurative works on paper. His practice is rooted in dialogue with his sitters, with drawings emerging through dynamic, febrile lines that trace their evolving relationship. Through this process, Holder brings visibility to people whose stories are often overlooked in mainstream narratives, revealing the tenderness, presence and emotional resonance of each subject.

To view the artworks discussed in this episode visit:
https://britishportraits.org/resources/podcast/episode-one

Host:
As Contemporary Curator at the National Portrait Gallery, Tanya Bentley works with the Senior Curator of Contemporary Collections to look after the Gallery's large collection of contemporary portraits (2000 - present). Tanya researches the collection, makes acquisitions, commissions new portraits and curates exhibitions, temporary displays and gallery rehangs of contemporary portraiture at NPG. Tanya is currently curating a three-year rotating exhibition (2023-26) of materials from the Lucian Freud Archive held at NPG.
The Understanding British Portraits Podcast is a series that explores current ideas and debates around the power of portraiture. The series investigates who gets to be depicted in portraiture, how we should display and talk about portraiture and how portraits can help us tell the stories of people underrepresented in the arts. The episodes are curated and presented by guest hosts who come from a wide range of backgrounds in the art history, heritage and museum worlds.
Visit https://britishportraits.org/resources/podcast to find out more.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.