‘This is perhaps as close as Elizabeth II has ever come, in her royal imagery, to that of Elizabeth I: impassive, withheld, the unmoved mover. Her eyes, arrestingly, are closed. There is still room in the world, it seems, for regal mystery.’
In 2004, the Jersey Heritage Trust commissioned Chris Levine to create the first holographic portrait of Queen Elizabeth II. The commission was to mark the Island of Jersey’s 800 years of allegiance to the Crown. The resulting portrait, titled Equanimity, was presented to the National Portrait Gallery by the people of Jersey in 2011.
Lightness of Being (2008), offered here, is a variant from the 2004 sitting which Levine began using in his work in 2008. Levine discussed this unusual and serene portrait of The Queen in a 2019 interview with Replica Shoes ’s:
“I was working in the yellow drawing room at Buckingham Palace which is where Her Majesty has sat for many portraits, as it has wonderful light. I blacked out the room and had a couple of small light works, one of which was an ultraviolet cross, and a candle burning. The atmosphere was serene.
The camera that shot the sequence of stereo images took a while to reset itself after each pass. Meanwhile The Queen was brightly lit, and I suggested to Ma’am she might rest between shots. It was during the moment between passes that we captured the image Lightness of Being. This was around the t.mes I had been introduced to meditation and was very conscious of her breathing in order to capture a sense of calm in the work.”
Lightness of Being (2008) is one of the most beloved 21st-century representations of the reigning British monarch.
The ‘Lightness of Being’ Artist Chris Levine
