Sir Hugh Roberts | |
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Born | Hugh Ashley Roberts 20 April 1948 Portsmouth, England |
Nationality | British |
Occupation(s) | Art historian and curator |
Spouse | Jane, Lady Roberts |
Children | 2 |
Sir Hugh Ashley Roberts GCVO FSA (born 20 April 1948) [1] is a British art historian and curator. [2]
He was the Director of the Royal Collection, the art collection of the British Royal Family, and Surveyor of the Queen's Works of Art, whose office is responsible for the care and maintenance of the royal collection of works of art owned by the Sovereign of the United Kingdom in an official capacity.
Roberts was closely involved in the restoration of Windsor Castle, a medieval castle and royal residence located in Windsor, Berkshire, England, notable for its long association with the British Royal Family and its architecture after its 1992 fire.
He was previously a director of Christie's, an art-business and a fine-arts auction house, and was the head of its Decorative Arts Department. His particular area of expertise is French and English furniture and interior decoration of the 18th and 19th centuries; he has written extensively on these subjects in Royal Collection exhibition catalogues and major journals.
On 20 April 2010, on his retirement as Director of the Royal Collection, Roberts was appointed a Knight Grand Cross of the Royal Victorian Order. [3] and Surveyor Emeritus of The Queen's Works of Art
Roberts graduated from Corpus Christi College, Cambridge in 1970. On 13 December 1975, Roberts married The Hon. Jane Stephanie Low (later Dame Jane, Lady Roberts, DCVO), a daughter of the 1st Baron Aldington; they have two daughters.
Anthony Frederick Blunt, styled Sir Anthony Blunt from 1956 to November 1979, was a leading British art historian and Soviet spy.
Sir Hugh Maxwell Casson was a British architect, also active as an interior designer, an artist, and a writer and broadcaster on twentieth-century design. He was the director of architecture for the 1951 Festival of Britain. From 1976 to 1984, he was president of the Royal Academy.
Sir Joseph Edgar Boehm, 1st Baronet, was an Austrian-born British medallist and sculptor, best known for the "Jubilee head" of Queen Victoria on coinage, and the statue of the Duke of Wellington at Hyde Park Corner. During his career Boehm maintained a large studio in London and produced a significant volume of public works and private commissions. A speciality of Boehm's was the portrait bust; there are many examples of these in the National Portrait Gallery. He was often commissioned by the Royal Family and members of the aristocracy to make sculptures for their parks and gardens. His works were many, and he exhibited 123 of them at the Royal Academy from 1862 to his death in 1890.
The office of Surveyor of the King's/Queen's Works of Art in the Royal Collection Department of the Royal Household of the Sovereign of the United Kingdom is responsible for the care and maintenance of the royal collection of works of art owned by the Sovereign in an official capacity, about 700,000 objects - many of museum quality. The collection is spread across the various official and historic residences. Those objects in the official residences are in constant use. Objects in the Royal Collection are distinct from those objects owned privately and displayed at Sandringham House and Balmoral Castle and elsewhere. The Surveyor oversaw conservation of works of art: there are three conservation workshops, including a recently constructed workshop in the Home Park, Windsor.
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On 20 November 1992, a fire broke out in Windsor Castle, the largest inhabited castle in the world and one of the official residences of the British Monarch. The castle suffered extensive damage and was fully repaired within the next five years at a cost of £36.5 million, in a project led by the conservation architects Donald Insall Associates. It led to Queen Elizabeth II paying tax on her income, and to Buckingham Palace, the former monarch's other official residence, being opened to the public to help pay for the restoration work. This event was part of what Queen Elizabeth II called her annus horribilis.
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Edward Bowring Stephens, was a British sculptor from Devon. He was honorary secretary of the Institute of Sculptors circa 1861.
Delia Mary, Lady Millar C.V.O., was the wife of the British art historian and Surveyor of the Queen’s Pictures, Sir Oliver Nicholas Millar and an art historian in her own right. A specialist in the art of the Victorian era, she was appointed Commander of the Royal Victorian Order in recognition of her services to the Royal Collection.
Sir Hugh Roberts, Director of the Royal Collection and Surveyor of the Queen's Works of Art, 1996–2010; now Surveyor Emeritus, 64