Saturday, July 9, 2016

A Bit of Old Hollywood at the Portrait Gallery

Where: National Portrait Gallery

When: through September 11, 2016

The Portrait Gallery is offering viewers a walk down memory lane with this exhibit of TIME magazine covers featuring Hollywood stars.

The museum has a collection of the art featured on over 2,000 covers of the periodical, which I'm assuming must be the largest such collection in existence.  It makes for a rich source of exhibits, I'm sure; we've seen others before and will doubtless see more in future.

I do wonder, however, if this gives the publisher some free publicity - are these shows advertisements for TIME?  I realize that the art now belongs to the museum, so it's not as if they're showing works that are on loan from a private collection, which is frowned upon in museum circles.  Still, though, it did cross my mind...

As for the show itself, it's fine.  Nothing ground-breaking, famous Hollywood types that you've seen many times before.  The wall notes suggest that the pictures might stir memories of movies from yesteryear, so clearly, they're not targeting this to the younger set.

Verdict: If you're a fan of Hollywood celebrities, have a look.  Otherwise, not worth a special trip.

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