Day 13~ The National Portrait Galley

Today, 6/04/08 we went to the National Portrait Gallery, and with the restoration topic on my mind from seeing in Westminster Abbey, I wondered why the restoration artists here did some of the things they did. For example, when I came to the Bronte sisters I was surprised to see the alteration that was made to the painting. There information on the side of the painting said that there was once a pillar in the middle but it was discovered that underneath it was a self portrait of Patrick Bronte. It seemed to me the restoration artists in this case did the opposite of their jobs and reversed the painting to reveal the missing self portrait of the Bronte sisters’ brother, who painted this particular painting. As my walk through the gallery continued I soon found that Virgina Woolf’s sister painted the portrait that was on display and so did Jane Austen sister Cassandra.
I was surprised that each of these female authors had a sibling that drew or painted their picture during their life period. I do have to say the sketch I was interested with the most was Jane Austen’s sketch. I was surprised to see it not finished and in a very tiny frame a special box to keep it safe. I was curious why it was not displayed as the other paintings were on the wall in the romantic era room. I was wondering if it was because it was so small or if it was because of the water color? Also I was able to use the IT catalogue while I was there and found out that there was three other portraits the gallery had and wanted to know why those were not out as well. What made the gallery put out the have finished sketch instead of the others? What was the criteria that determined the rotation for the portraits?
The sketch of Austen did make me think of Persuasion and with Austen in the same room as Wordsworth I thought about what each of them might say. It seemed Austen was very "camera" shy because there were not many pictures done of her where as Wordsworth there was quite a few. It seems that Austen might be horrified that her portrait was on display, because it seemed she was a private person. It is funny to think of Jane Austen as a shy person when reading some of her novels because they contain some very out going characters. It almost seems she was only outgoing in her novels and that was her outlet.
In the National Portrait Gallery I did not feel it was marketed as much of a tourist attraction as the National Gallery was and I wondered why that was the case. Was it because it just held portraits and not much else or was it because not everyone knows who the portraits are of so they are not as interested? I am not saying that I knew who everyone was but it was exciting to see the portraits on the wall of the authors we have spent our college careers learning about. So it leads back to the question should people be educated to go to the museums, and in this case I believe the answer is yes because, it would create more of an interest for people to go an see the museum.