Just months after acquiring a picture of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle a world-renowned London gallery has refused to display it.
In a major blow to Prince Harry and Meghan Markle, a spokesperson for the National Portrait Gallery in central London has admitted it won’t put up a picture of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex that it acquired earlier this year.
The image in question is a black and white portrait captured which shows the couple standing side-by-side at the opening of the One Young World summit in Manchester two years ago, and it was taken by the couple’s friend, Misan Harriman.
The spokesperson said: “The portrait of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex was acquired for the Gallery’s photographs collection in May 2024.
“Following cataloguing and its digitisation, the portrait was added to our website at the beginning of this month. There are no current plans to display the portrait in the gallery.”
The National Portrait Gallery holds one of the world’s best collections of portraits, and its patron, Princess Kate, has no say over which are added to the collection.
The picture was captured when Harry and Meghan were at the One Young World summit (Image: Getty)
The photographer, Mr Harriman, is a globally celebrated celebrity who became the first black man to shoot a cover of British Vogue in the magazine’s 104-year history.
The admission of Harry and Meghan’s portrait comes after The Mail on Sunday revealed that the Royal Collection has no photographs of Meghan in its archives of more than a million objects spanning five centuries of the monarchy.
However, images of the Royal Family do not automatically become part of the Royal Collection. They are in fact often donated by the photographer or are specially commissioned.
In January 2012, St James’s Palace announced Princess Kate’s patronage of five charities, one of which included the National Portrait Gallery.
Her first solo public engagement was the opening of the Lucian Freud Portraits exhibition and Kate also collaborated with the Gallery on the ‘Victorian Giants: The Birth Of Art Photography’ exhibition in 2018.
There were rumours last year that Princess Kate was secretly pleased when a controversial portrait of her, painted by artist Paul Emsley, was removed from public view.
It was moved out of public view and into storage at the National Portrait Gallery to be viewed “by prior appointment” only.
A royal commentator speculated on why the work had been consigned to a storeroom when The Princess of Wales’s first comments were “brilliant” and “absolutely amazing” when the portrait was unveiled in 2012.
The diary editor for the Daily Mail, Richard Eden states critics were less kind, however, and attacked the work of art, calling it “ghastly” and “rotten”.
A source told the editor: “It’s unthinkable that the painting of Her Royal Highness would be removed from public view without consulting her. That would be very discourteous.”
