The Evening Standard profiles Jonathan Yeo on the news that his portrait of David Cameron has been auctioned at a Conservative party fundraiser for £200,000. Of course, the profile can’t escape the dichotomy of Yeo’s being well known for his portraits and his collages made from pornographic images:

“There’s a queue to buy the collages, whereas I have to graft a bit to sell the portraits.” And if anything, this more controversial work has widened the audience for his oils. “The only job I may have lost was painting the Archbishop of Canterbury,” he says. “We were down to a shortlist of two — but the porn may have not have been the deciding factor.” It was the commissioning process that would lead to George Bush becoming Yeo’s first collage subject. Having been selected, “I was made to jump through hoops, sending endless sketches and CVs, dealing with the White House and the immigration department. Clearly, the assumption was that Bush would lose the 2004 election — because when he won, I never heard another word.” Continue Reading