Dr Nicholas Cullinan is director of the National Portrait Gallery in London, which reopens in June 2023 after a three-year-long refurbishment. Born in Connecticut and raised in Yorkshire, he studied History of Art at the Courtauld Institute of Art in London, where he also gained his PhD.
He has been a curator at some of the world’s most important cultural institutions, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, London’s Tate Modern and Fondazione Prada in Milan. Dr Cullinan lectures internationally and has written for many art journals and exhibition catalogues, as well as publishing books on Cy Twombly and Robert Rauschenberg. npg.org.uk
My all-time favourite piece of music is Jean-Philippe Rameau’s Tristes apprêts, from his opera Castor et Pollux of 1737.
What's everyone reading?
I remember hearing my sisters playing Michael Jackson’s Off the Wall on vinyl when it first came out, so the songs from that album really stick with me.
I’m currently listening to Alé Araya and Aisu’s song Citrine. It sounds like the future.
The book that influenced me the most is probably Marguerite Yourcenar’s Memoirs of Hadrian, published in 1951.
I’m currently reading Patrick Bringley’s All the Beauty in the World, which is about his 10 years spent as a museum guard at The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. As a former museum guard and someone who worked at the Met, it nails the very particular thing of spending your days in galleries, and how close you grow to the works and the people that come to see them.
I’m currently watching the latest series of Happy Valley – it’s all set and filmed in the Calder Valley, where I grew up. I also watch Mean Girls quite often!
My favourite artwork – well, the one I’ve spent a lot of time with recently – is Joshua Reynolds’ 1776 Portrait of Omai (and Elizabeth Peyton’s drawing made after it, and indeed in front of it, earlier this year).
I’m excited about Vendelmans, my partner’s gallery. The first exhibition presents works by avant-garde artist Alice Frey (1895–1981), who came to prominence in Belgium during the interwar period. Her paintings are hyper-romantic and dreamlike.
My favourite restaurant is Cafe Van Gogh, my local vegan eatery in Oval (named because Van Gogh lived nearby). It has great food, atmosphere and lovely staff.
I don’t know if it’s the best exhibition I’ve ever seen, but I saw a great Corot show at the Manchester City Art Gallery as a child that made a big impression on me.
I’m pretty obsessed right now with Arlington House in Margate, a great brutalist building, with extraordinary beach views and a wonderful community around it.
This year, I’m looking forward to the National Portrait Gallery reopening.
