Rolf Harris (2005)
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At the Royal Albert Hall on September 29th 2003, Rolf Harris performed live before a packed house at a Golden Jubilee concert to celebrate his 50 years on British television. His fans were enchanted as he reprised his favourite routines and hit songs. When the event was screened on television on December 6th, it made the cover of Radio Times and was watched by an estimated seven million.
In January 2004, an avuncular Rolf Harris presented yet another BBC1 television series about art entitled Star Portraits with Rolf Harris (A Hotbed Media Production). Each programme lasted 30 minutes and this time Harris left his brushes at home; however, the focus was again the magic of the creative process. Each week surprised celebrities had their portraits painted by three professional artists in different locations. In the first programme, for instance, artists Sheree Valentine-Daines, Robin Elvin and Amanda Danicic portrayed the talk-show host Michael Parkinson in Bray-on-Thames. This series was lightweight and undemanding. It did not provide any new or deep insights into the genre of portraiture, which some theorists think is exhausted and in crisis. Unlike so many radical artists, Harris does not question conventional assumptions about art and its sub-categories. All twelve portraits resulting from the series were displayed at the New Art Gallery, Walsall from January to March 2004.
Experts on modern art will probably dismiss Rolf Harris as a banal, minor, anachronistic painter and as a relentless populariser of figurative art (but not conceptual art, which leaves him cold). Yet, he arouses grudging admiration for his tenacity, accessibility and for his ability to reach so many ordinary people. If series such as Rolf on Art were the only kind of arts television available then we should be worried, but if they are part of a spectrum of programmes, some of which are more demanding, sophisticated and scholarly, then perhaps we should not be unduly concerned.
Rolf Harris: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8
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