Having resigned myself to a life of mockery by office colleagues after foolishly confessing that I didn't know what grime was, I'm deeply thrilled to discover I am in the vanguard of the visual arts, as I'm having my portrait painted. The Royal Society of Portrait Painters has announced that since Kate Moss sat for Lucian Freud, bookings for likenesses in oils have gone up by 30 per cent. Maybe it's a reaction to the speed of everyday image-making. Now that cameras on mobiles can give you any picture, ranging from your foot to your mum, by way of someone mooning, and send it instantaneously to anyone, anywhere, sitting for hours in front of a painter seems, by contrast, a rather extraordinarily charming occupation.
Well, sometimes. The Royal Academician Maurice Cockrill is struggling with the Millard visage at present, and we are both having a rather tough time of it. Every so often, he stands back from the easel, then grabs a flat knife and scrapes what looks like a vast amount of paint off the canvas, sighing. Meanwhile, I, helpless on the other side, reintroduce my ankles to the novel idea of blood circulation.
Sitting for a portrait is not at all like sitting around for other things - a bus or a doctor's appointment, for instance. Chatting is off-limits, and listening to Radio 5 Live (for example) certainly not allowed. Maurice and I did listen to a bit of Messiaen the other morning, which was stimulating, but that was a rare moment. Most of the time the sitter must just wander about in his or her mental space, while the painter grapples with inspiration. You can't drift off too far, though; nor, naturally, can you actually fall asleep. And you shouldn't be thinking about things that might result in a startling change of expression, or whoops of hysterical laughter. Each session lasts about two and a half hours, which is a long time to look at a white wall, so I have developed a gripping strategy.
First, I relive the births of my four children at University College Hospital (forceps, longed-for but denied Caesarean, umbilical cord around the neck, great views of the Telecom Tower, lovely midwives, even nicer babies). No, this is uplifting. Then I attempt a score of pelvic floor exercises, reasons for which I refer you to the details above. I think about why people sit for portraits, and wonder what William Pitt the Younger was thinking about while Gainsborough was scraping oil from his canvas and sighing. After these diversions, it's time to work out what we're having for supper. I glimpse Cockrill's watch. Precisely four and a half minutes has elapsed since I last did this. I snatch a glance out of the window. A jumbo jet flies past. A minute later I hear its roar. Such experiences are not common in London.
Cockrill is Keeper (director) of the Royal Academy Schools, and as such is granted his own studio at the Academy. He has his personal garden below, a tiny patch between the Academy and the Albany Courtyard, reached by a circular descent known as the Model's Stair. I imagine previous keepers, who include Henry Fuseli (1804-25) and Charles Landseer (1851-73), organising tutorials for the students with women who would arrive for the session and elegantly glide up the Model's Stair clad only in a "wrapper". Perhaps Cockrill also organises tutorials with models in wrappers. Who knows? These are the thoughts that skim through my mind as I sit silently, in a blue shirt, in the white, north-facing studio at the Academy.
