8 million on portraits of the King

[AskMeMore]

As part 0of the Coronation the government are spending 8 million pounds on photographs of Charles to send out to institutions around the country. The idea is that organisations will display the portrait on their walls.
This is a ridiculous waste of taxpayers money. If a school or local authority want to display a photo of Charles, they can buy it themselves. Most would not though. This is totally unwanted.

Seems a waste of money at the present time.

8 million pounds sterling, are you sure?!! That is so much money it’s actually quite disgusting.

There’s homeless people all around the UK as well as people who are going hungry. Why can’t the 8 million help them? Members of the public love to say things like, ‘we don’t have a money tree,’ but there’s clearly money available for things like this?

What do we need to do to get rid of the RF? It’s almost a slap in the face to hear of that much money getting spent on nonsense. It’s not the 1600s, we don’t need a king!!

What's that - c. 12 pence per person?

I cannot get worked up about this.

hehe - I think you're missing the point.

This will be the tip of the iceberg - and yes, it is disgusting when the use of foodbanks has increased by around 80% in the past 5 years (the Trussell Trust website points this out - and that doesn't even include the figures from the last 6 months)

It's great that you can't get worked up about it - but that sure doesn't mean nobody else should either.

So awful. I hope my kids school don't but up the picture. Don't want them having some bloke who was born into a role in anyway revered.

Same applies to you OP “he he”. Just because you get worked up about it doesn’t mean that other people have to.

If schools or LAs were to pay then you’d probably complain that it was disgusting because they could have bought themselves eg a large box of pencils instead.

I have talked about this on other threads and I was told it is 'optional' and public buildings don't have to have it. I have been challenged endlessly on my absolute disdain for this. So much for Charles wanted a quieter slimmed down Monarchy, eh?

If I had to go into the Council offices and there was that daft portrait hung in pride of place, I would burst out laughing. It's pathetic. We're not North Korea.

And all those saying £8million is nothing, it will not help anyone, it won't rescue the NHS... embarrassing! If it helped ONE childrens charity, I'd be happy. Hunger payments for kids in school holidays was axed, it could've gone towards that for instance.

Here it is. Feast your eyes on this beauty.
Ridiculous... this being hung in police stations, fire stations, council offices is a joke.

Even if you are a royalist how can you justify this? Just how? Charles is one of the richest people in the country, why the fuck is he not paying for this vanity project? Why?
Oliver Dowden, Culture Minister tweeted how wonderful it all was saying how the Government was paying for this. Fuck off. We pay for the Government. WE, the taxpayer, are paying for it. I challenged him on that.

It is another nail in the coffin for me on Charles. He lied about slimming down. I was honestly prepared to give him a chance but he is just lying. Slimmed down... smaller coronation... now portraits.

12 pence per person that could be spent on better things. Not prop up some guy's ego.

That portrait is a strange one, he looks bemused?/confused? and the hand in the jacket instead of trouser pocket looks weird. Did he choose this or was it down to the artist?

This isn't a Royal family issue, it's a government one. Why on earth is the government forking out 8 million for portraits when they could be spending the money on something else. Nothing to do with King Charles, I'm sure he doesn't want to be faced with badly photocopied over priced versions of a portrait every time he goes anywhere!

“If schools or LAs were to pay then you’d probably complain that it was disgusting because they could have bought themselves eg a large box of pencils instead.”

A box of pencils is useful.

He looks like he's holding in a fart.

It is not law.

If Charles said he didn't want it. Or he wanted to pay for it. He could have.

Of course it's not law, if no one requests a portrait, they won't get one. But there is no suggestion that King Charles expects it or has asked for this. It's simply the governments way of wasting a bit more money, just add it to all their other cock-ups.

Perhaps Charles could put his money where his mouth is and say 'I do not want that portrait and £8million of taxpayers money spent on this'

And 'I will pay for it' (if he wants this).

Not hard.

Bloody hell

It’s to replace the Queen one I suspect if places want it

Having a change of monarch is going to cost as things get switched over

I know some want nothing spent on this but it’s just how it is in our system as it is

This is what I find perplexing, beyond the 8 mil which frankly blows my mind. The artist chosen benefited seriously from one of the Queens financial support programmes for artists, in that he was funded to study at the Florence academy atelier to learn traditional portraiture techniques. For anyone who doesn’t know, these Italian ateliers teach a particular method of painting from life, ie the model has a number of sittings and the artist is able to paint them there and then. It’s a far superior method of portraiture, perhaps the ‘gold standard’. It’s a VERY expensive course (it also teaches traditional paint making/ canvas prep/ composition etc). Yet the portrait of Charles is painted entirely from a photograph, so although this artist was chosen because he’d been on this Royal funded pathway, he was then funded again to complete the work in a way which wouldn’t make use of this expensive training.
so why would a photograph not suffice ? Or at least just smudge up a photograph digitally (because that’s what it looks like) to look like a painting, and spare us this costly process?

That is very interesting @Smokingonthestairs I didn't know anything about the artist.
I have to say, I don't like his facial expression, it's just not totally like him in my opinion. But I am not artistic.

I find the whole thing obscene when local councils are raising taxes and cutting public services.

To be fair I definitely associate King Charles with the hand in jacket pose. Don't think they're all owed to put hands in trouser pockets, it's probably against royal protocol or something. So I think the portrait is quite nice. And having one painted at a reasonable cost is fine imo. But spending £8m to distribute copies...nah, unnecessary expense that could be put to better use. I also do agree with PP would pointed out even though £8m seems vast, in the scheme of helping individuals it doesn't go far.

If they’ve got £8mil for schools it should be on improved ventilation and HEPA to reduce number of colds and infections (increase attendance) and increase concentration.

I hate this stupid logic.

£12p per person could still go towards something much better

There is absolutely zero use of pictures of the king. Each school could print one from Google if they really want one.

At a time of so much need, the only justification of the coronation is if it attracts tourists and generates extra cash.

£8m on random extra photos will not

Is it just me or does KC's body looks stacked compared with his tiny head? And the arm angle is off. Probably just me.

An official photo would have sufficed.

Well painting from photographs will always result in something that’s a bit eerie, a bit creepy looking. It just seems that if Charles wants to support traditional craftsmanship and methods, (and he seems to want to with his drawing schools etc), and he feels funding money is well spent teaching people to paint in the traditional manner (from life) at the cost of many thousands of pounds, the least he could do is put his money where is mouth is and show the value of these skills by actually sitting for a portrait, as the Queen did many times.