Official portrait released to poor reviews

The first official portrait of Catherine, the Duchess of Cambridge, has been unveiled at London’s National Portrait Gallery — but has met with a mixed reaction from art critics and the public.

Paul Emsley, who spent three-and-a-half months painting the Duchess’s likeness, said he had tried to portray her warmth and personality in the picture.

The Duchess reportedly telling Emsley at a private viewing on Friday that it is “amazing… brilliant.”

Charlotte Higgins of the Guardian claimed the painting transformed “a pretty young woman… into something unpleasant from the ‘Twilight’ franchise.

In the Independent, art critic Michael Glover wrote that the portrait was “catastrophic,” combining “hamsterish” cheeks and “hair whose featheriness has been borrowed from an advert for shampoo.”