The Decline of Smoking in British Portraiture

BMJ Specialist Journals Press Release

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[The decline of smoking in British portraiture 2004; 13: 3-6]

A study of portraits in London's National Gallery, painted between 1950 and 1999, shows a sharp fall in the number of subjects adorned by a cigarette, cigar, or pipe. In the 1950s and 1960s around one in 10 of the portraits portrayed smoking, after which tobacco products all but disappeared completely from the canvas.

The authors, from the University of Otago in Wellington, New Zealand, remark that this reflects the actual decline of smoking among the UK population. But this contrasts starkly with the portrayal of smoking in television and the movies, which has steadily increased over recent decades, they point out.

Click here to view the paper in full:http://press.psprings.co.uk/tc/march/3_tc6635.pdf