Pride in Soho

The LibDem LGBT group DELGA had a stall at Soho Pride this afternoon, so I stopped by for a couple of hours to help man it. It was encouraging to see how many of the (predominantly young) crowds of thousands milling around came up to sign DELGA’s petition against homophobic bullying in schools — a problem that is still prevalent (and even tolerated by some teachers), despite positive changes in legislation and public attitudes in Britain.

Although I have never lived in Soho, it has been a sort of ‘second-base’ for me in London for over 20 years, and I have been a member of the Soho Society for a long time. That is why I came up with the idea of my little book ‘Soho Characters of the Fifties and Sixties’, which the National Portrait Gallery published in 1998 and which completely sold out (though, alas, it has as yet not be reprinted). I still enjoy calling in on various places in the ever-changing yet always fascinating area. This afternoon, as often, I tried ‘something old and something new’: a glass or two of chilled rosé at the French House and a delicious Olivier salad at a new Georgian café round the corner, called (and run by) Romeo.

Links: http://delga.org.uk and www.thesohosociety.org.uk

BP Portrait Award 2008

One of my favourite press views each year is the BP Portrait Award at the National Portrait Gallery in London. A a biographer, I am fascinated by real people, warts and all, and the BP award always attracts some amazing faces and characters as sitters. There were 1,727 entries this year, nearly a third of them from abroad. Only a fraction can be shown in the special exhibiton in the NPG’s Wolfson Gallery, which opens to the public tomorrow. I was particularly struck by entries from Romania and Bulgaria. But the four short-listed works for this year’s prize of £25,000 plus a £4,000 commission are portraits by Simon Davis, Peiyuan Jang, Robert O’Brien and Craig Wylie. Peiyuan Jiang’s portrait of her flatmate is an uncanny photorealistic piece — a style followed (not always so successfully) by several other entrants. The exhibition will run until 14 September and is accompanied by a book to which the detective novelist Alexander McCall Smith has written an introductory essay.

Link: www.npg.org.uk/bp/