Does anyone like King Charles’ official portrait? I understand the artist didn’t intend this, but I look at it and see imperialism soaking in blood.
The BBC calls it “vibrant”, but they would. The butterfly seems like an ironic touch, or maybe a reference to the flitting silliness of the man’s brain.
I actually rather like the painting for it’s weirdness and the ability to read whatever I want into it — and I don’t like royalty, or this dimwitted king, so that’s what I see. You’ll have to come up with your own meaning.
Also, does the king actually have sausage fingers?
It reminds me of the portrait of Vigo the Carpathian. The face seems disconnected.
Also, in real life king prince Charles has ears that stick out more.
Kneel before the Blood King!
He looks like a ghost emerging from the raggedy peeling wallpaper of an abandoned house in a horror movie.
Behold the Cheshire King! Would that he would vanish as easily as the cat….
@4 Exactly! The ghost of a long forgotten thing, showing up in an age where it does not belong, to be banned forever by the end of the movie!
Very fitting. Call the Ghostbusters!
I don’t know much about Englan’d’s King Charles III but I know what I like..
.. I also strongly suspect I can guess who “my” (or at least my countries) symbolic hereditary Monarch cheers on during the Ashes too!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ashes
It ain’t Oz.
We’re still not a Repulic yet, still governed by a figurehead born to the upperest of Upper-upper-upper class English aristocrats? How fucking embarrassing. Sure would suck if Britain became a Republic before we did.
That’s an “official portrait?” Ya gotta be kidding me. Whose “official” idea was that?!
That reminds me, in about a week the trial of that fool Heinrich Prinz Reuß will start.
The utterly unimportant descendent of some provincial ruling family, he didn’t like democracy, modern Germany and the Jews and thought by storming parliament with some armed like minded thugs he could install a new government with himself as king. Luckily the police found out about their plans before anything could happen.
Hopefully he and his pals will be locked away for a long time.
Someone used midjourney and asked for “a portrait of king charles of england as vlad the impaler”
And, of course, the butterfly looks like a Monarch.
I was going to say something about Monarchs performing some kind of reverse colonization, but, their occasional occurrence in England is apparently by stragglers from Monarch-colonized Spain, and not resident butterflies.*
*
https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fevo.2019.00362/full
Oliver Cromwell: “Paint my picture truly like me, and not flatter me at all; but remark all these roughnesses, pimples, warts, and everything as you see me.”
Charles III: “Make it red, okay. No, redder than that.”
I King Charles actually approved this unconventional portrait, I think much better of him, entirely apart from my views of the portrait itself.
Artist thinking “What do I do with the dozend buckets of red that my hare-brain assistant accidentally ordered” Wait…”
It’s a good likeness, and after looking at some photos I can confirm that he indeed has sausage fingers.
Other than that, it’s a bloody awful portrait. Adding a Monarch butterfly is bizarre. It’s not native to England, and merely adds a touch of cliche to the bad art.
Holbein? I’m offended that the BBC even mentioned the Master’s name in this context. Holbeins art is absolutely amazing , and this red mess is dreck.
Be fair! He may not be very bright, but he must be extremely brave – look at all those medals!
Brought this to mind… https://media.cnn.com/api/v1/images/stellar/prod/190725131539-francis-bacon-untitled-pope-tease.jpg?q=w_2000,c_fill
Sausage fingers might explain his trouble with pens.
It’s like a can of tomato sauce exploded.
@ 10 mordred : Meanwhile Trump wants to become effectively King or even Gawd-Emperor of the USoA with unlimited power and he’s well on the way to getting it..
@8. Personally , I’d like to see Australia become a nation with not a King or a President but instead First Elder chosen by our Indigenous People but then we could’n’t even get thre Indigenous Voice to Parliament through last year. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2023_Australian_Indigenous_Voice_referendum ) Disgustingly and depressingly destroyed the same way the 1999 epublic referndum was – by divide and conquer plus scare-mongering lies. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1999_Australian_republic_referendum )
.***
Anyone else get the pareidolia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pareidolia ) of dog faces in the red splotches of this painting? Specifically wirecoat / rough coat “bearded” scruffy terriers e.g. Jack Russells / Border terriers on the right hand side of Charlie de Turd’s head and shoulders? Like patterns in clouds or flames..
I’m sorry, but he looks like a used tampon.
Autobot Silverwynde @ #22 — As I recall there’s a recording of him saying that’s what he wants to be.
I’m sorry. All I can see is Han Solo encased in carbonite.
I prefer Holbein’s portrait of Charles de Solier. Not only is it exquisitely detailed in depicting the fabrics and gold, but the gaze of the subject is riveting.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Portrait_of_Charles_de_Solier,Sieur_de_Morette&wprov=rarw1#/media/File%3AHans_Holbein_the_Younger–Charles_de_Solier%2C_Sieur_de_Morette-_Google_Art_Project.jpg
The famous portrait of Henry has a clear affinity with this earlier work.
Hopefully a non-borked link. It works in preview.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Portrait_of_Charles_de_Solier,_Sieur_de_Morette&wprov=rarw1
How do you know, Charles is dimwitted, prejudiced much? And I rather like the portrait, though I am not sure about the red.
If The King In Yellow is a thing, why not The King In Red? He just needs to add a lot of cosmic horror.
Photography was invented some time ago.
Portraits such as these are made to be flattering, but AI can do that these days, too.
An old custom where the inferior representation is supposedly better, though it takes longer, is costlier, and is less accurate.
Is it only me who can see the little man in a trenchcoat and bucket hat bringing him a cup of tea over his left shoulder?
At least Vigo The Carpathian (Ghostbusters 2) and Shaddam IV (Dune) had visions for their reign. Mainly evil visions, but they weren’t content to be figureheads.
Damn, everyone has beaten me to the Vigo references.
Diablo mini boss for mine
cartomancer @30:
Nonsense. It’s a blonde in a miniskirt.
The arrogance and privilege of people like that is so off the charts it beggars my power of description. It is appalling but mostly hidden from public view. Here is a brief video of Charles, in the midst of signing something making a face for the benefit of an underling and flinging his sausage hands in a shooing motion because he is too exalted to pick up the little tray and move it himself.
I wish the artist had gone the full Francis Bacon: Screaming King, in a triptych.
No more anodyne king could there be.
(PS he’s a bit wokish, in that inimitable British way, best as I can tell. Also, a certain touch of woo)
—
[nostalgia]
Hey, anyone else remember Walton? (A nym here, in days of yore)
Looks like something you would find in a ruin in Elden Ring
A message to Hanibal Lecter on how he wishes to be served in response to Trump’s passing on the invitation to dinner from Lecter…
… or he asked the artist to portray everyman’s opinion of how bright he was.
@John Morales #37,
Yeah, he’s generally pro-environment, although he continued fox hunting for longer than most woke folks would like. Also generally supportive of indigenous rights and against deportation of migrants. Pretty much silent on LGBTQIA+ issues, but so was his mom, although supposedly (saith Stephen Fry) she was privately in favor of gay marriage. He’ll probably get quieter about all his personal opinions now that he’s king; the Windsors are more strongly committed than the average Starfleet captain to cultural non-interference. They know they’re basically mascots.
Not a terribly deep thinker by all accounts, but probably smarter than the average Kardashian.
Smart enough politically to make his opinion known without making his opinion known:
Government: “now you’re king you can’t go to COP27, that would be political”
KCIII: “Fine. I’ll just host a post-COP26 event right here.”
At first glance I immediately thought of Han Solo frozen in carbonite, and the style & color palette is extremely Francis Bacon, but people have already mentioned those, so I’ll just add that in Mexico & elsewhere in Central America, monarch butterflies are associated with the souls of the dead. Dia de los Muertos, if I recall correctly, is timed to happen around the arrival of migrating butterflies. So, I’m going to go ahead and say this portrait is depicting Chuck 3 as some kind of blood-drenched god of death. Very Warhammer 40k really.
Cripes, I think I just talked myself into liking this painting.
What’s curious to me is that the painting of the king himself seems to have been well done in the artistic sense, from the client’s point of view. His face, while recognizable, is shown at its most flattering: “careworn but not unkind, the sort of face you would happily bank with,” as the good book says. His posture likewise, to the extent I can manage to see it. The butterfly is a nice touch, at least assuming the audience is unfamiliar with the native insects of the British Isles (and, to be fair, Charles is also king of Canada, to which the species is native). But, having done all this, the painting then does its level best to ensure that the audience will ignore it all. Surely at some point someone involved must have noticed that the subject appears to be drowning in a sea of blood.