A new portrait of Kate Middleton, the Princess of Wales, has sparked controversy online, with some royal fans criticizing the work for the way it portrays the future British queen.
The painting, by Anglo-Zambian artist Hannah Uzor, is on the cover of the July edition of Tatler magazine. The objective is to honor the “strength and dignity” of the princess, according to a statement from the publication sent this Thursday (23) to CNN .
The image depicts Kate during her appearance at the first official banquet of King Charles III's reign, and Uzor said he studied photographs of the princess in the process of creating the work.
“When you can't meet the model in person, you have to look at everything you can find and piece together the subtle human moments revealed in different photographs: do they have a particular way of standing or holding their head or hands? Do they have a recurring gesture?”, she said in the statement.
Uzor also revealed that Kate's recent video announcing a cancer diagnosis helped with the work.
“All of my portraits are made up of layers of personality, built from everything I can find about them,” she said in the statement.
However, not everyone liked the princess's portrayal.
“This is terrible – somehow I’m not sure the artist is a fan of the Princess – looks like a bad GCSE project,” reads one comment on a Tatler post on X.
“She looks nothing like the Princess of Wales. It’s so horrible it’s disrespectful,” says another.
“I agree with the feelings of strength and dignity, but the portrait bears no resemblance to that of the Princess of Wales,” said another.
However, some praised the work, with one calling the painting “beautiful”.
“Am I the only person who likes it? It’s art, not a photo,” wrote another commenter.
And it wasn't just social media users who reacted to the painting.
Alastair Sooke, chief art critic for the British newspaper The Daily Telegraph, said in an article that the painting was “intolerably bad” and “shows no resemblance to its subject.”
“Has there been a more flattering, lifeless royal portrayal in history?” Sooke wrote. “Under a Lego-like helmet with monotonously brown, unmodulated 'hair', this Princess of Wales has as much charisma as a silly figurine atop a wedding cake.”
Kate Mansey, royal editor of The Times of London, was also unhappy.
“I’m not sure what to say about this other than, hmm…” she wrote on X.
The backlash follows a similar row surrounding the first official portrait of King Charles III since his coronation, which was unveiled earlier this month.
The painting by British artist Jonathan Yeo depicts the monarch wearing the uniform of the Welsh Guards, sword in hand, against a fiery red background that seems to almost swallow him whole, while a butterfly appears about to land on his shoulder.
While the king is happy with the portrait, others criticized the red brushstrokes, with one person comparing it to a “horror movie poster.”
Source: CNN Brasil
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