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British RoyalsKing Charles III

Explore Prince Charles’ artwork on Google Arts and Culture

Google Arts and Culture is giving us the opportunity to look at Prince Charles the watercolourist, some of the pictures, with the ability to zoom in on them, his inspiration for painting, and the benefits he has gained from it. Prince Charles has been a keen painter for most of his life, influenced in part by the tremendous collections of art in the Royal Palaces, and encouraged by his late maternal grandmother, Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother.

The influence of the Queen Mother can also be seen in the pictures painted around her Castle of Mey in Scotland. After her passing, Prince Charles, or the Duke of Rothesay as he is known in Scotland, took on many responsibilities associated with the castle. But this is by no means the only location, and the images put together by Google show that the Prince has clearly had his easel with him on foreign tours as well as those to various places within the United Kingdom.

The comments indicate that for Prince Charles the opportunity to paint gives him a chance to forget the world around him and its angst and instead to focus on the image and expressing that on paper. For him, that transfer from what the eye sees, slowly transferred by the hand to an image that slowly builds into a picture is far more important than just the quick click of a camera. Painting may not be the answer for everyone, but the idea of finding a way to take yourself away to your own special place once in a while is a good way of de-stressing.

The Prince is considered to be a keen and accomplished watercolourist and has sold some of his paintings as well as writing books on the subject. He has also exhibited paintings home and abroad including an exhibition of lithographs of his country estates that were displayed in Florence. In 2011, he received a patronage award from the Montblanc Cultural Federation for his commitment and support of the arts, especially for young children.