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'POSE'
Artists & Models
From 18th March until 2nd April 2026 | Online and at the gallery
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‘Pose’: Artists & Models is a small display exploring the relationships between artists and the individuals they selected to pose for them.
For much of its history, portraiture has operated within a system of patronage. Likenesses were frequently commissioned to convey status, lineage, wealth or achievement. These works demanded a careful balance between accuracy and flattery; the sitter’s expectations were integral to the finished image. However accomplished, these portraits were shaped by external requirements as well as artistic intention.
‘Pose’ turns instead to those works made beyond the formalities of patronage. When artists select their own models, the terms of engagement shift. Artists might employ professional models, but sometimes they rely on friends, family members or partners. When a genuine relationship exists between artist and sitter, the whole working process often assumes a greater freedom.
Familiar sitters can be reconfigured, stylised, or quietly observed over a period of years with a candour and informal flexibility that would be unthinkable in the production of a formal, commissioned portrait. This often results in works that feel more intimate, occasionally playful, and frequently more experimental and progressive.
This display also makes clear the importance of the model. In many cases, a figure recurs across an artist’s work, becoming integral to the development of style or the exploration of a particular theme. Modelling requires stamina, sensitivity and an ability to inhabit a pose or persona over sustained periods of time. In close collaboration with the artist, the model’s presence and skill shape composition and mood.
The display includes several new acquisitions by seminal figures such as Dod Procter, Edward Burra, Duncan Grant, and Harold Harvey.
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