Queen bucks the tradition of royal art patronage

Charles I commissioned Rubens and Van Dyck. George III bought Canalettos and a Vermeer. And even dry old Queen Victoria acquired vast quantities of Italian, German and Flemish art.

But since Elizabeth II ascended the throne 50 years ago, just 20 paintings have been added to the Royal Collection. There have been drawings aplenty, including views of Windsor by artists such as Turner and a collection from the artists of the Royal Academy. Similarly, royal advisers have sought out hundreds of objets d'art.

Yet the collection of 7,000 paintings acquired by British monarchs over several centuries has been scarcely expanded. Instead, the Queen has pursued a policy of making purchases with associations with past sovereigns.

There are two portraits of the Queen, by James Gunn in 1953, the year of her coronation, and the controversial painting by Lucian Freud donated by the artist last year. A painting of Queen Victoria's Golden Jubilee garden party was bought at auction at Christie's as was an oil sketch of Victoria by David Wilkie.

Sir Robert Fellowes, formerly a private secretary to the Queen, is in a work commissioned from David Poole. Yet Diana, Princess of Wales, was not. But there are no portraits of the Duke of Edinburgh or Prince Charles either.

A spokeswoman for the Royal Collection yesterday acknowledged that the Royal Family is no longer able to bid for some of the most significant and expensive works of art.

Partly this is because the Royal Collection is self-financing through the income from the opening of the palaces and retail sales at their shops. That income was £16.7m last year.

But there has also been a change in policy. "The focus of the Queen's reign has been on increasing public access and on creating conservation workshops," the spokeswoman said.

The public appear to like seeing royal art. Last February, an exhibition of 10 drawings by Leonardo da Vinci increased visitor numbers to the Lady Lever Art Gallery in the Wirral almost five-fold. Visitors have also poured into the Queen's Gallery, a permanent collection next to Buckingham Palace, which was revamped at a cost of £20m earlier this year. Next week another gallery, costing £3m, opens at the Palace of Holyroodhouse in Edinburgh.

Visitors to these collections also get to see items from the Royal Family's private collections, many of which are likely to go into the Royal Collection. The Duke of Edinburgh, for instance, has collected modern art by artists including Barbara Hepworth. The late Queen Mother built up a collection which included a Monet.

Of the 20 pictures acquired for the Royal Collection since 1952, eight were bought at auction and six from dealers.

But Martin Bailey, of The Art Newspaper, which investigated the acquisitions, said the modest scale of purchases raised the question of what the Royal Collection was for. "The two recent portrait commissions of courtiers, and even more so the donation of the Freud portrait, may perhaps turn out to be the more tentative steps towards a more ambitious collecting policy," he said. But he added: "Future generations will regret that Charles and Diana were never depicted in a double portrait for the Royal Collection. The hope must remain that pictures from the private family collections may eventually enter the Royal Collection."

Collection is modest in number, modest in price and largely modest in quality

What are paintings for? Should they challenge us emotionally and intellectually? What should a monarch's criteria be when amassing paintings for the Royal Collection?

The Queen may have asked herself one of these questions over the past half century. Or then again she may not have. That is the conclusion we reach after an examination of the modest list – modest in number, modest in price and largely modest in quality – of the 20 paintings she has bought for the Royal Collection since 1953.

Only one is not a portrait of a royal. The vast majority are good, or fairly good. They do not tell the story of British art over the years that they were acquired. And, with the exception of two recent portraits of courtiers and a rather alarming donation by Lucian Freud, which shows the Queen with wrists thick enough to (dis)grace a Tamworth pig, they do not tell us anything about what has happened to painting in the past 150 years.

And yet this list does not give us a full portrait of the Queen's taste either, because there is also her private collection. Perhaps, in private, she may have been squirrelling away enough transgressive art to please Jay Jopling.

All the paintings in this list were executed between the beginning of the 17th century and the present. One of the painters, William Hogarth, is a genius, and the purchase of The Family of George II in 1955 looks timely and well considered. The satirist's formal portraiture was much undervalued in his lifetime. Others are safely good or, at the very least, were highly regarded in their day: Gerrit van Honthorst, who was invited to paint at the court of Charles I; or Sir Godfrey Kneller (1649-1723), the leading portrait painter of his day. A less stiff and more unusual choiceare the pictures by Johann Zoffany (1733-1810), whose paintings of theatrical life can be seen inthe Garrick Club. Two paintings by Sir David Wilkie (1785-1841), a vigorous portrayer of village life, are also refreshing. Less so is Head of Charles II by a mediocrity called Antonio Verrio (d.1707).

Largely dull? Yes. Fairly safe royal record? Yes. Overall purpose of collection deserves to be discussed with rest of family and other interested parties before the monogrammed cheque book is whipped out? Yes.

Michael Glover

Changing face of the Palace art collection

THE ACQUISITIONS

1953 James Gunn, 'Portrait of the Queen'; Sir Godfrey Kneller, 'Queen Anne'

1954 Jacopo Amigoni, 'Anne, Princess Royal'

1955 William Hogarth, 'The Family of George II'

1957 Fred Morgan and Thomas Blinks, 'Queen Alexandra with her three eldest children'; Jacob van Doort, 'Charles I when Prince of Wales'; Johann Zoffany, 'The family of George III (sketch)'

1958 Gerrit van Honthorst, 'The Four Eldest Children of the King and Queen of Bohemia'

1961 William Dobson, 'Charles II when Prince of Wales'

1966 Louis-Gabriel Blanchet, 'Princes Charles Edward Stuart' and 'Prince Henry Benedict Stuart'

1975 Sir Godfrey Kneller, 'Mehmet'

1984 Gerrit van Honthorst, 'Sophia, Princess Palatine'

1990 David Wilkie, 'Queen Victoria' for 'The First Council' (oil sketch)

1992 Johann Zoffany, 'William Henry, First Duke of Gloucester'

1994 Frederick Sargent, 'Queen Victoria's Golden Jubilee Party'

1996 Antonio Verrio, 'Head of Charles II'

1998 Justin Mortimer, 'Lord Arlie'

1999 David Poole, 'Sir Robert Fellowes'

2001 Lucian Freud, 'Portrait of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II'; Sir David Wilkie, 'Portrait of Sir William Knighton'