Ornament
Collecting
3. Desmond Shawe-Taylor
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3. Desmond Shawe-Taylor

Discussing the role of royal and national collecting.

In this podcast episode, I sit down with my former colleague at the Royal Collection Trust Desmond Shawe-Taylor, Surveyor of the Queen’s Pictures from 2005-2021. In this episode, we discuss the particular role of royal collectors, and if there is really a motivation for art collecting as a Prince and how that sometimes becomes a form of ‘national’ collecting (if there is such a thing). During my ten years working at the Royal Collection, Desmond and I worked closely on a range of curatorial matters: in particular exhibitions. The First Georgians (2014) was led by Desmond; likewise he led on Charles I at the Royal Academy ( 2018, with Per Rumberg), while I worked on the coeval exhibition on Charles II at The Queen’s Gallery (2017, with Martin Clayton). We also spent a lot of time thinking about ‘palace display’ - we both worked on the improving the appearance, picture hang and arrangement of furniture and objects in the State Apartments at Windsor Castle, all of which came under the broader ‘Future Programme’ project, which was mostly completed just prior to lockdown in March 2020.

Inline Image - Desmond Shawe-Taylor
Desmond Shawe-Taylor CVO
Dulwich Picture Gallery

Paintings in the Royal Collection: clockwise from top left: Attributed to Titian, The Lovers; After Titian, Titian and his Friends; Durer, Burkhard of Speyer; Rembrandt, Christ and St Mary Magdalene at the Tomb; Cuyp, The Passage Boat

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Ornament
Collecting
Rufus Bird discusses art collecting today and throughout history with a wide range of experts, professionals, collectors and those involved in the market today.
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