Ralph Heimans on painting the Queen, Kevin Rudd, Judi Dench and more

It makes sense that artist Ralph Heimans studied pure mathematics, as well as fine art.

His stunning portraits – of everyone from Queen Elizabeth II to actress Judi Dench to then Crown Princess Mary – are meticulously planned and executed.

The proportions, the composition, the angles, the perspective are just so.

“You need that left brain element as well,” he said, of creating his uber-realistic yet still otherworldly portraits.

That’s quite apart from his attention to detail which teases out the story and the humanity of the subject, usually after months of research.

Heimans with his painting of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II at the National Portrait Gallery in 2012. Picture by Rohan Thomson

“The human dimension is the most important dimension,” Heimans said.

“If you don’t feel or empathise with the subject, if you’re not transported emotionally in some way by the painting, then it hasn’t succeeded. It’s not enough to be engaged intellectually.”

The exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery may be called Ralph Heimans: Portraiture. Power. Influence but the artist is focused on discovering the person behind the position, whether that be now King Charles III or Australia’s 26th prime minister Kevin Rudd or writer Margaret Atwood.

HRH Crown Princess Mary of Denmark, 2006 by Ralph Heimans AM. Picture supplied

“I’m extremely excited,” he said, from his studio in Sydney.

“It is the first major exhibition I’ve had in Australia, apart from having some works permanently in the collection of the National Portrait Gallery.

“The gallery been a huge support throughout my career. So many of the breakthroughs I’ve had have actually originated from the gallery. So I owe a lot to the gallery, and it’s very fitting that the first show I have in the country is there.”

The Honourable Dame Quentin Bryce AD CVO, 2014 by Ralph Heimans AM. Picture supplied

But now it is here – opening at the National Portrait Gallery on Friday March 15 and continuing until May 27.

The Australian show was first talked about when Heimans had a major retrospective at the National Portrait Gallery of Denmark in 2018, after painting a portrait of then Crown Princess Mary in 2006 and then being commissioned to paint then Crown Prince Frederik for his 50th birthday.

“The original discussions were that that exhibition would travel to Australia but then it was decided Australia would develop its own show and that is what has happened and finally come to fruition,” he said.

The exhibition in Canberra will feature examples of his royal portraits including those of then Crown Princess Mary and Crown Prince Frederik and then Prince Charles.

There will also be portraits of public figures including then Governor-General Quinten Bryce and Justice Michael Kirby.

And also examples of his work from private commissions, sourced from collections around the world.

The exhibition also includes studies of his famous painting of Queen Elizabeth II in 2012 for her Diamond Jubilee and of Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh, painted in 2017.

The portrait of the Queen is now part of the Westminster Abbey Collection and the one of Prince Philip is in the Royal Collection, the Queen so taken by the depiction of her husband that she made sure to acquire it.

“Those portraits are very large. The one of the Queen is permanently installed in the Abbey as part of the fabric of the Abbey and is 2.5 by 3.5 metres. It’s a massive work and doesn’t move, effectively,” Heimans said.

But Heimans’ Diamond Jubilee portrait of the Queen was on display at the National Portrait Gallery for six months over 2012-2013, attracting 100,000 people, leading the gallery to say it was its most popular painting ever.

It’s remarkable that three of Heimans’ subjects have now become monarchs themselves since he painted them – the now Queen Mary and King Frederik of Denmark through the abdication of former Queen Margrethe, and King Charles III through the death of his mother in 2022.

Not that they rang him to tell them of their change in circumstance.

“There have been follow-ups with most of the royals at various occasions, but we’re not on speed dial,” Heimans said with a laugh.

Heimans, 54, grew up in a “middle-class, stable, sheltered, suburban” environment in Cremorne on the lower north shore of Sydney.

At Parliament House in 2023 after his portrait of Kevin Rudd was unveiled. Picture by Keegan Carroll

His father was a documentary maker, his mother a French teacher. His younger brother, Jeremy Heimans, was a co-founder of the activist organisation GetUp!.

Heimans started painting with oils when he was just 14.

“I think going to Mosman High, which had the best art department possible for me, that was really helpful in defining my vocation. Because while I was at school, I won the National Art Prize and with the prize money I was able to travel and work out my path. I was quite a headstrong young man determined to be an artist but I wanted to find my own path.”

The prize money allowed him to head straight to Europe “where I felt very much at home. Close to the old masters. They were my source of inspiration”. He now divides his time between London and Sydney.

“London has been for the past 30 years my main work base. In the 1990s I moved to Paris from Sydney and all my work was based in London and I moved there in earnest in 2007,” he said.

His wife Tami and their daughters Ellie-Rose and Hannah will be at the exhibition opening at the National Portrait Gallery in Canberra on March 15.

Justice Michael Kirby, a former subject and long-time supporter of Heimans, and the portrait gallery were instrumental in securing him the honour of the Golden Jubilee portrait of the Queen. And, before that, the gallery put his name forward to paint Crown Princess Mary. Heimans says the portrait gallery has been central to his work.

“The early Australian years really did set up my entire career,” he said.

Heimans is now working on a portrait of English anthropologist Dr Jane Goodall.

“The portrait is destined to go to the Natural History Museum in London which is very exciting,” he said.

“They’ll be a sort of Australian component to that as well, because there’s a chapter of the Jane Goodall Institute in Australia.”

And there will be chimpanzees in the portrait.

“I’ve already had a sitting with Jane at her home in Bournemouth in the UK but she’s going to be in Africa and I’m going to join her there in July. I’m going to find the chimps,” Heimans said, with a laugh.

Ralph Heimans on painting…

Princess Mary of Denmark, 2006

HRH Crown Princess Mary of Denmark, 2006 by Ralph Heimans AM. Picture supplied

Ralph Heimans painted now Queen Mary of Denmark in 2006. He had his first meeting in Denmark with then Crown Princess Mary in 2005, when she was fresh into her royal role, just a year after the Tasmanian-born former real estate agent had married then Crown Prince Frederik.

“It was an extremely exciting commission. It was my first royal portrait [and I stayed] as artist-in-residence in the royal palace, one of the royal residences which was Frederiksborg Castle. It was a very easy encounter with her. The cultural familiarity really did help.

A compositional study of the portrait. Picture supplied

“But I was able see her in this particular period, very early on in her role. She’d only been princess for a year at the time and she was actually pregnant with her firstborn. It was within the first three months, so it hadn’t been announced. So it was a very exciting time. She was adapting to her role and there was a lot of buzz around her. And she was emerging as this fashion icon. She was learning Danish.

“I really caught her at this sort of early stage and it was very interesting to see how she was adapting to the role, the seriousness and dedication – I could just see. She would occasionally break out into Danish when she was talking to me. Her head was so into taking on this new role. I saw [her] as somebody who was adopting this very professional stance to becoming a princess. It was a moment of vulnerability, trying to find her footing in this new role and, of course, there was public scrutiny of her. So I tried to express some of those ideas in the painting.”

Dame Judi Dench, 2018 by Ralph Heimans AM. Picture supplied

“Just such a wonderful, down-to-earth person. Very warm.

“We met in the Royal Haymarket Theatre, which she had chosen as the venue for her portrait because she has some of her best early memories of life in the theatre there.

“The painting was very much based on that idea of her thinking back to her early times in the theatre, so she’s turning over her shoulder and looking back, at the spot in centre-stage in between the wings at front of stage which is quite an exciting place to be in an empty theatre.”

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