![]() The story behind this painting is what caught my admiration. The Prime Minister, Sir Winston Churchill, has been celebrating his 80th birthday in a day of ceremonies and tributes to his remarkable career. Charlie Chester and a signed self portrait cartoon by George Robey. His 80th birthday, on November 30, 1954, had been the occasion of a unique. One MP called the portrait “a study in lumbago,” and Lord Hailsham said it was “disgusting, ill-mannered, terrible.” Churchill accepted the gift with a measured good humor, but privately he muttered, “It makes me look half-witted, which I ain’t.” After the unveiling, the painting was never seen again - shortly before Churchill’s death, his wife had it cut up and burned. In honor of Sir Winston Churchill’s 80th birthday, Graham Sutherland was commissioned by the state to paint Churchill’s portrait. In 1954 Graham Sutherland (1903-1980) was commissioned by both Houses of Parliament to paint a full-length portrait of Winston Churchill, to celebrate his 80th birthday. 3 Finding the depiction deeply unflattering, Churchill disliked the portrait intensely. “The artist had obviously been unhappy about them and they had been painted over since it would have been impossible to ‘cut off’ his legs below the knees without radically altering the proportions and placing of the picture on the canvas.” The painting was presented to Churchill by both Houses of Parliament at a public ceremony in Westminster Hall on his 80th birthday on 30 November 1954. “Its chief defect was that it looked unfinished in as much as his feet were concealed in a carpet that seemed to have sprouted a dun-coloured grass,” wrote Studio editor G.S. The painting, by Graham Sutherland, was a decidedly modern take on the octogenarian statesman. The ceremony took place before a crowded Westminster Hall, and no one present, one observer said, “will forget the idiosyncratic nonsound with which a thousand people stopped breathing when the canvas was revealed.” ![]() ![]() ![]() Sold for £8,285,000 via Christie’s (March 2021). VINTAGE WINSTON CHURCHILL BIRTHDAY COMMEMORATIVE COIN 1874-1954 A vintage Sir Winston Churchill 80th Birthday commemorative bronze coin 1874 - 1954, which displays the face of Winston Churchill on one side and words on the reverse. Winston Churchill faced an awkward moment in 1954, when Parliament unveiled a portrait on the occasion of his 80th birthday. In the ninth episode of the first season of Netflix's The Crown, Graham Sutherland paints Churchill's portrait as an 80th birthday gift from Parliament, but Prime Minister Churchill hates that portrait, in episode : (as per google Sutherland's Portrait of Winston Churchill) The presentation ceremony at Westminster Hall was recorded by the BBC. The Tower of the Koutoubia Mosque (1943) Sir Winston Churchill: The Tower of the Koutoubia Mosque, c.1943. ![]()
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