'Holograms' at the National Portrait Gallery

To the National Portrait Gallery in London for the presentation of 'Equanimity' (described as a holographic image of Her Majesty) to the NPG on behalf of the people of Jersey.


A few years ago, the artist  Chris Levine  received a commission from Jersey to create a holographic portrait of Queen Elizabeth II.  The project was conducted as a creative collaboration with the holographer Rob Munday, with help and assistance from Nina Duncan and Jeffrey Robb. The VIP camera system was developed especially for the shoot by Rob Munday.   A holographic stereogram was recorded at Buckingham Palace and the resulting large format hologram, made at John Perry's Holographics North in the USA, was subsequently exhibited at the Palace, at the Houses of Parliament and on various other occasions, using blue LED lights to create a monochrome 3-Dimensional image.

Chris Levine with 'Equanimity'

Since then, Lenticular versions of the image have been created in various different formats and 'Lightness of Being', another portrait of the Queen (this time with her eyes closed) which derived from the same photoshoot, has been widely reproduced in magazines and has become a best-selling image for Chris Levine. (He generously gave me a digital print of it when it was hot off the press).


To celebrate 60 years of the Queen's reign, the National Portrait Gallery have been touring an exhibition "The Queen: Art & Image", which includes both "Equanimity" and "Lightness of Being" in lenticular form, as the opening and closing images of the exhibition respectively.

Rob Munday kindly invited me to join him at the NPG for the opening ceremony where I managed to snatch a picture of him and Chris in front of "Equanimity".


Also present was Jeff Robb, now a successful lenticular artist in his own right,
who collaborates with Levine on art projects like the  Grace Jones portrait series.

Here's Jeff with "Lightness of Being".

Also present were veteran holographers Jeff Blyth and Graham Saxby (pictured above with Jeff Robb) and 3D champion David Burder whose lovely postcard sized version of "Equanimity" came framed in a goody bag at the end of the show.


I remember going to see "Equanimity" when it was at Buckingham Palace and, apart from being thrilled to see the work, the best moment was hearing a uniformed flunky directing the visitors: "This way to see the hologram". After 30 years of working with holograms it felt great to hear the word spoken in such elevated surroundings. I can only imagine how exciting it was for Rob, Jeff and Chris on the original shoot.


And it was exciting yesterday to see the work of several old friends on display at the NPG which, despite the fact that the description of the works promulgates the idea that lenticulars and holograms are the same thing,  has at least got 3D imaging into a national museum for the second time in a year (the last being the  Boy George hologram at the V&A).


I can't resist mentioning a personal connection with the portrait of the Queen which is that, shortly after the photoshoot with her, Jeff invited me over to Spatial Imaging and recorded a lenticular portrait of me using the same camera system.

holographic stereogram