(London) After three years of work, the famous National Portrait Gallery in London reopens its doors to the public on Thursday and wants to be more “representative of today’s United Kingdom”.
A long-awaited exhibition of never-before-seen photos of the Beatles marks the return of this museum after work valued at 41.3 million pounds ($69.4 million), which notably made it possible to create new places for the public, a new entrance and a learning center.
In addition, the museum wanted to carry out a “rebalancing in what we exhibit, so that it is more inclusive and representative of the United Kingdom of today”, explained Alison Smith, chief curator at the National Portrait Gallery.
“Before the closing, there were more portraits of men than of women. We looked into the question and today, 48% of the works exhibited are portraits of women. »
“We made the exhibition more representative of the UK in terms of ethnicity, social class, disability,” she says.
British artist Tracey Emin, for example, was commissioned to create an art installation in the gallery.
His work, The Doorsdepicts 45 female faces, cast in bronze and placed on the doors of the National Portrait Gallery.
Five self-portraits by female artists were also acquired to shed light on the often overlooked stories of women who helped shape British history, the museum said.
The main exhibition of the summer, however, will be devoted to the most famous of English groups, with more than 250 unpublished photos of the Beatles taken by singer Paul McCartney.