The Portrait Now was a major international overview of contemporary portraiture held in 1993–1994 at the National Portrait Gallery in London. Among many others it included portraits by Michael Andrews

Michael Andrews (artist)

Michael Andrews was a British painter.-Life and work:Michael Andrews was born in Norwich, England, the second child of Thomas Victor Andrews and his wife Gertrude Emma Green. He completed his two years' National service between 1947 and 1949, nineteen months of which was spent in Egypt...

, Frank Auerbach

Frank Auerbach

Frank Helmut Auerbach is a painter born in Germany although he has been a naturalised British citizen since 1947.-Biography:Auerbach was born in Berlin, the son of Max Auerbach, a patent lawyer, and Charlotte Nora Burchardt, who had trained as an artist...

, Francis Bacon

Francis Bacon (painter)

Francis Bacon , was an Irish-born British figurative painter known for his bold, austere, graphic and emotionally raw imagery. Bacon's painterly but abstract figures typically appear isolated in glass or steel geometrical cages set against flat, nondescript backgrounds...

, Tony Bevan

Tony Bevan (painter)

-Biography:Bevan was born in Bradford, Yorkshire. He studied at Bradford School of Art from 1968 to 1971, followed by Goldsmiths' College, London from 1971 to 1974, and the Slade School of Fine Art from 1974 to 1976...

, Chuck Close

Chuck Close

Charles Thomas "Chuck" Close is an American painter and photographer who achieved fame as a photorealist, through his massive-scale portraits...

, Jim Dine

Jim Dine

Jim Dine is an American pop artist. He is sometimes considered to be a part of the Neo-Dada movement. He was born in Cincinnati, Ohio, attended Walnut Hills High School, the University of Cincinnati, and received a BFA from Ohio University in 1957. He first earned respect in the art world with...

, Peter Edwards

Peter Edwards (artist)

Peter Douglas Edwards, born 20 November 1955, British painter. Winner of the 1994 BP Portrait Award.- Early life and career :Peter Edwards was born in Chirk, North Wales, the son of Harry William Edwards, who came from a brewing family , and Annie May Williams, daughter of Allan Williams killed in...

, Stephen Finer

Stephen Finer

-Work:Finer participated in "British Art from the Arts Council Collection 1940-80" at the Hayward Gallery, 'Collazione Inglese ll' at the Venice Biennale and was in the touring exhibition, 'Men on Women', 'The Portrait Now' at the National Portrait Gallery and 'Painting the Century 101 Portrait...

, Lucian Freud

Lucian Freud

Lucian Michael Freud, OM, CH was a British painter. Known chiefly for his thickly impasted portrait and figure paintings, he was widely considered the pre-eminent British artist of his time...

, David Hockney

David Hockney

David Hockney, CH, RA, is an English painter, draughtsman, printmaker, stage designer and photographer, who is based in Bridlington, Yorkshire and Kensington, London....

, Jeff Koons

Jeff Koons

Jeffrey "Jeff" Koons is an American artist known for his reproductions of banal objects—such as balloon animals produced in stainless steel with mirror finish surfaces....

, Leon Kossoff

Leon Kossoff

Leon Kossoff is a British expressionist painter, known for portraits, life drawings and cityscapes of London, England....

, Alice Neel

Alice Neel

Alice Neel was an American artist known for her oil on canvas portraits of friends, family, lovers, poets, artists and strangers...

, Julian Schnabel

Julian Schnabel

Julian Schnabel is an American artist and filmmaker. In the 1980s, Schnabel received international media attention for his "plate paintings"—large-scale paintings set on broken ceramic plates....

 and Andy Warhol

Andy Warhol

Andrew Warhola , known as Andy Warhol, was an American painter, printmaker, and filmmaker who was a leading figure in the visual art movement known as pop art...

.

Subjects

Varied subjects included self-portraits: Koons, Beltrami, Neel, Penck, less known figures and some famous names: Joseph Beuys

Joseph Beuys

Joseph Beuys was a German performance artist, sculptor, installation artist, graphic artist, art theorist and pedagogue of art.His extensive work is grounded in concepts of humanism, social philosophy and anthroposophy; it culminates in his "extended definition of art" and the idea of social...

 by Warhol, Marlene Dietrich

Marlene Dietrich

Marlene Dietrich was a German-American actress and singer.Dietrich remained popular throughout her long career by continually re-inventing herself, professionally and characteristically. In the Berlin of the 1920s, she acted on the stage and in silent films...

 by Finer, President Mitterrand

François Mitterrand

François Maurice Adrien Marie Mitterrand was the 21st President of the French Republic and ex officio Co-Prince of Andorra, serving from 1981 until 1995. He is the longest-serving President of France and, as leader of the Socialist Party, the only figure from the left so far elected President...

 by Organ, Archbishop Desmond Tutu

Desmond Tutu

Desmond Mpilo Tutu is a South African activist and retired Anglican bishop who rose to worldwide fame during the 1980s as an opponent of apartheid...

 by Marisol

Marisol Escobar

Maria Sol Escobar , otherwise known simply as Marisol, is a sculptor born in Paris of Venezuelan lineage, living in Europe, the United States and Caracas.-Education:...

, Seamus Heaney

Seamus Heaney

Seamus Heaney is an Irish poet, writer and lecturer. He lives in Dublin. Heaney has received the Nobel Prize in Literature , the Golden Wreath of Poetry , T. S. Eliot Prize and two Whitbread prizes...

 by Edwards

Peter Edwards (artist)

Peter Douglas Edwards, born 20 November 1955, British painter. Winner of the 1994 BP Portrait Award.- Early life and career :Peter Edwards was born in Chirk, North Wales, the son of Harry William Edwards, who came from a brewing family , and Annie May Williams, daughter of Allan Williams killed in...

, and 'The Smoking Man' a video portrait by Marty St.James.