Artist Who Paints Royal Family Portraits Recalls Prince Harry’s Unkind Nature Toward Prince William
Because Prince William and Prince Harry spent their entire lives in the spotlight, some royal watchers used to feel like they knew them. They were seen as two brothers who were brought up in an insanely privileged lifestyle and poised to take on roles that few could ever understand. Then on Aug. 31, 1997, they lost their mother, Princess Diana, and people around the world mourned with them.
In the years following Diana’s death, the princes appeared closer than ever. In 2011, Harry stood alongside William as the best man at his wedding, and William did the same for his younger brother seven years later. From the outside everything appeared fine. But there was a rift brewing behind the scenes. Harry later admitted to that in the documentary Harry and Meghan: An African Journey as well as during a televised interview with Oprah Winfrey. And those were before his explosive memoir Spare was released which shattered the image that the princes were so close.
But for those who worked with the royals, the signs that the princes’ close relationship was just an illusion may have always been there. Here’s what an artist who painted a portrait of the Duke of Sussex and the Prince of Wales remembers about the time she spent with them.
Portraitist was criticized over how she painted Prince William
Nicola Jane Philipps, also known as Nicky Phillips, is a British artist who has painted portraits of royals, including Queen Elizabeth II, multiple times. Phillips admitted that the late monarch wasn’t the easiest to paint as she was a bit fidgety during one session. The artist also shared what Princes William and Harry were like when she worked with them.
Phillips created the first double portrait of the princes together for the National Portrait Gallery and had them visit her home on five different occasions in order to complete the painting.
“They were in full uniform and they just walked around, into the house and not one single one of my neighbors noticed anything, and this happened five times,” she recalled.
The portraitist told The Times that while the two did seem close, she remembered that Harry and William were having a sort of fallout as the younger prince was giving his brother a hard time about the fact that he was balding, saying that William had too much hair in the painting.
Phillips revealed that she was later criticized by others as well for not painting William “true to life.” In an episode of Keeping Up With The Aristocrats, she said that criticism was for giving the prince more hair than he actually had on his head.
“That was in 2008 when I got savaged for giving William too much hair,” she shared. Phillips added that he did have much more hair then and that a lot of it fell out sometime after she did their portrait.
Royal commentator says Phillips’ account is proof the royals are ‘just like the rest of us’
But a royal commentator doesn’t see Harry’s pre-rift banter with William as anything too serious and that it goes to show how the royals really are just like the rest of us sometimes.
While discussing Phillips’ account on Sky News Australia, Daily Mirror Royal Editor Russell Myers opined: “What this tells you I think is that the royal family are pretty normal most of the time. They’re just like us.
“It’s pretty strange when they’re living in castles and palaces and being driven around in Bentleys but when they’re asked to do something like that … If you ever had a family photograph that is taking a bit too long at a family gathering, we can all understand about these instances that go on with people’s characters and I found it most amusing.”
