Kate Middleton's latest portrait draws flak, contrasting past royal covers

LONDON (TND) — A recent portrait of Kate Middleton, the Princess of Wales, is garnering some criticism online for the future British Queen.

British-Zambian artist Hannah Uzor is the artist behind the painting for Tatler magazine's July 2024 cover and said the princess "has really risen up to her role" adding "she was born for this. She carries herself with such dignity, elegance and grace."

The cover is a follow up to Tatler's July 2022 Platinum Jubilee cover of Queen Elizabeth II and the July 2023 Coronation cover of King Charles III, the magazine stated.

"The two portraits inspired the new Akoje Residency in collaboration with the King’s Foundation, for African, Caribbean and diasporic artists to spend time at the King’s estate, Dumfries House in Scotland, to focus on their artistic practice," a post on Instagram read.

Uzor told CNN she studied photos of the princess while she was creating her art and depicted Catherine during her appearance at the first state banquet of King Charles III's reign.

"When you can’t meet the sitter in person, you have to look at everything you can find and piece together the subtle human moments revealed in different photographs: do they have a particular way of standing or holding their head or hands? Do they have a recurrent gesture?" she said in the statement obtained by CNN.

However, not everyone was impressed with the painting and took to social media to express it.

One commenter wrote on Instagram," This portrait is awful, there are so many amazing artists out there, surely they could have found a better one."

"A very poor portrait which totally fails to represent the beauty and elegance of the Princess of Wales," another said.

Chief art critic at UK newspaper The Daily Telegraph, Alastair Sooke, wrote in an article the painting was "intolerably bad" and "shows no flicker of resemblance to its subject."

Kate Mansey, royal editor at The Times of London, wrote on X that she wasn't "quite sure what to say about this one, except, hmm..."

A portrait of King Charles III had similar backlash when it was revealed earlier this month.

The vivid image, painted by British artist Jonathan Yeo, depicts him in the bright red uniform of the Welsh Guards - which he was made Regimental Colonel in 1975 - against a background of similar hues.

In the comments section of the Instagram post, one commenter wrote "I'm sorry but his portrait looks like he's in hell."