Lucian Freud, Queen Elizabeth II (2001, Royal Collection Trust), oil on canvas, on display at The Queen: Portraits of a Monarch, at Windsor Castle in 2012 Freud: Royal Collection Trust/© Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II 2022.

High on drama, low on psychology, Annigoni’s three-quarter-length image of a Queen firmly at the nation’s helm was a big hit with the British public, attracting ten-deep crowds when it was shown at the Royal Academy, in London, in 1955. Gazing out into the distance, the dashing monarch is set against a stylised landscape that owes more to Quattrocento Tuscany than 1950s Britain.

Swathed in the robes of the Order of the Garter, Elizabeth comes across as aloof and regal but she is also a moody heroine straight out of the Daphne du Maurier novels that were especially popular at that time. Photograph: Stephen Chung / Alamy Stock Photo Pietro Annigoni's baroque swagger, 1955Ĭommissioned by the Worshipful Company of Fishmongers and still housed in Fishmongers' Hall next to London Bridge, this is an unashamedly romantic portrait steeped in the style and techniques of the Renaissance, with more than a pinch of added baroque swagger. Pietro Annigoni's Queen Elizabeth II (1955, Worshipful Company of Fishmongers) on loan to the 250th Summer Exhibition at Royal Academy of Arts in London © Pietro Annigoni, All rights reserved. This confection of heritage glitter and glam was deliberately intended to pep up a gloomy post-war Britain, but at the same time the young Queen seems almost to be subsumed by all her ceremonial garb. Cecil Beaton's full-throttle fairytale monarch, 1953Īdorned with the full regalia of Imperial State Crown, orb and sceptre and clad in ermine cloak and a golden Coronation gown designed by the couturier Norman Hartnell, the Queen is presented as a full-throttle fairytale monarch with Beaton further ramping up a theatrical sense of history with a painted backdrop of the Gothic Lady Chapel in Westminster Abbey. They communicate as much about the changing status of the monarchy and individual artistic aims as they do about what went on behind the façade of an obdurately impregnable monarch. Yet, despite being recognised in every corner of the globe, she remained largely an enigma, familiar yet unknown, a symbol rather than an individual.Īmidst the plethora of portrayals here are six of the best. Queen Elizabeth II, the first British monarch to celebrate a platinum jubilee, became the most famous woman on the planet, spawning a multitude of images bearing her likeness in every conceivable medium.

Cecil beaton queen elizabeth