Michael Jackson: On the Wall exhibition explores images of the star

It's nine years since Michael Jackson died in Los Angeles yet his fame remains undiminished and his records still sell in huge numbers.

The singer would have turned 60 this August and to mark the milestone a slew of new books and re-releases are being published.

But the National Portrait Gallery in London had a different idea: to investigate how visual artists have used the image of one of music's greatest showmen.

Nicholas Cullinan took over as director of the National Portrait Gallery (NPG) in London in 2015. Before then, he had curated exhibitions on subjects ranging from Venetian glass to Edvard Munch and Henri Matisse.

But the first show curated by him at the NPG takes the gallery into ambitious new territory.

Michael Jackson: On the Wall isn't meant as a survey of the singer's life or music, Cullinan explains: "But now that a few years have passed since he died, I thought it was time to look at his legacy and his impact on an array of contemporary artists.

"There's probably no one else in recent history who attracted so much attention from artists wanting to capture his image."

SOURCE: BBC NEWS
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