When editor Sally Bulgin invited me to paint something platinum for The Artist in celebration of HM The Queen’s Platinum Jubilee, I had to think hard. The only thing I’ve ever seen in platinum is a ring, so I suggested I could, perhaps, create something to celebrate the occasion using silver. I’ve been painting quite a lot of silver since I showed you how to do it in my article in The Artist a couple of years ago. Perhaps the most complicated was Multiple Mug Shots, which was sold at the Royal Institute of Oil Painters’ annual exhibition at the Mall Galleries in November 2021.
My chosen composition, right, includes a wee portrait of her majesty, a Georgian style silver jug lent to me by a good friend, and some pearls. When I was a child The Queen always seemed to be wearing pearls, so when my mother wore them too, I thought she looked terribly posh.
