I’ve always thought the people on guided gallery tours look intensely bored, and thus cementing how I felt about history at school: YAWN!
Of course, it probably didn’t help that when I ‘learnt’ about history it was presented to the class by a ridiculously strict Tom Selleck lookalike, dressed head to toe in beige (my love for bright colours began at a very young age), and my mind was always in drama class interpreting a tree. Needless to say I flunked said subject. Badly. Anyway, enough of my repressed teenage traumas, and back to Lenard Pink’s Merry Monarchs and Dirty Trollops National Portrait Gallery tour, which curiously taught me more historical anomalies in two hours than I was taught in two years at school.
The creation of Mel Adams, international homosexual and historian Lenard is a flamboyant personality brimming with knowledge. Our tour took us through the Georgian, Tudor and Elizabethan era. Lenard not only explained the story behind the portrait, he also invited the group to take in all views of history (and the odd conspiracy). This of course added to the drama of the tour.
Aside from the fact that Lenard is camper than a row of tents at leather pride, what makes this tour different and ultimately much more fun is the presentation. Why should history be dull? Who says? It’s just the way it is. Lenard turns it on its head, and makes the whole subject much more engaging. He jokes with the group, drops in loads of double entendres (I was in heaven) and cajoles passing tourists, who were drawn in by his theatricality. It’s a guided tour but presented as if it were on the stage. The only slight criticism is that it was a tad over long, but that’s the danger with improvisation. Knowing when to trim back if every tour may be slightly different.
I left having laughed like a drain for two hours in an art gallery. Something I’d have thought improbable beforehand. And I thought to myself, “If Lenard had been my history teacher, perhaps I might have ended up being a young David Starkey, or that fella who was in Blackadder who now digs things up on the telly”. Who knows? I know one thing, I certainly wouldn’t have ‘achieved’ an F grade. A hilarious tour, highly recommended by this history novice.
• Tours run every Friday at the National Portrait Gallery. To book: [email protected]
