Dr Lucy Peltz and Professor Gill Perry, Session One: Portraiture and the Construction of Celebrity

Dr Lucy Peltz and Professor Gill Perry, Session One: Portraiture and the Construction of Celebrity This specialist academic conference developed themes raised in the exhibition The First Actresses: Nell Gwyn to Sarah Siddons. Speakers, including Professors Felicity Nussbaum (UCLA) and Joseph Roach (Yale), explored and problematised ideas of ‘celebrity’ culture and the symbolic, allegorical and discursive functions of portraits of women players. Focusing on visual representation, the conference brought together the research skills of international specialists in the different disciplines of theatre and performance studies, literature, music history and art history, deploying innovative interdisciplinary approaches in the understanding of portraiture and its historical meanings. In partnership with The Open University Podcasts relating to the exhibition are available in the National Portrait Gallery section of the Open Arts Archive.