By the age of 23, Rupert Alexander had already produced paintings of Prince Charles and the Duke of Edinburgh, making him the youngest artist since the 17th century to paint a member of the British royal family. And now the talented artist has another impressive entry to add to his CV after completing a portrait of Her Majesty the Queen. Revealed a week after the British monarch celebrated her 84th birthday, the subdued picture shows the Queen without her regal finery, and stands in contrast to other official portraits.
Its creator, 35-year-old Rupert, had three sittings with the royal, during which they chatted about his great-uncle, Alan Campbell-Johnson, who served as an aide to Earl Mountbatten – Prince Philip's uncle – when he was Viceroy of India. And while the sittings were originally scheduled to take four months, the artist found he faced quite a hurdle when it came to finding time in the busy royal diary. "There were three sittings scheduled with the Queen," a spokesman for Rupert confirmed. "Each was meant to be within a couple of weeks of each other."
"But because Her Majesty's diary was so full there was a year's gap between the second and final sitting. As a result, it took Rupert about 18 months to finish the painting. You could say it was a labour of love. "Speaking of his latest piece of artwork, London-born Rupert – a graduate of the Florence Academy of Art – said: "I decided to limit the portrait to head and shoulders as I wanted to focus on the more human and intimate aspects of her character, rather than the formal symbols of her public role."