I am delighted to have been asked to contribute to this exhibition, though I'm not sure that my eye isn't more omnivorous than discerning. I certainly enjoy images over a wide range of tastes, and have relished the chance to confront so many.

The world I grew up in was starved of formal images. In wartime, paper and therefore books were short, galleries were far away, newspapers were monochrome, postcards and reprints rare and treasured. But there was hope. My grammar school had been gifted a series of large framed old master prints for its classroom walls. I devoured these with a passion. Close my eyes and they are still some of my most vivid memories. Then came Picture Post, a glut of sepia photographs of the real world. In 1951 I took myself off to Manchester City Art Gallery - already loved for its abundance of Pre-Raphaelite pictures - to see the Festival of Britain Touring Exhibition set up by the new Arts Council. It was popularly thought of as scandalously modern at the time and I, defying my elders, championed its daring. But one picture stopped me speechless in my tracks. Lucian Freud's painting "Interior in Paddington". I thought it was wonderful then, and I still think so today.

When, 50 years later, an anniversary exhibition brought many of the pictures back together again, I was disappointed to see how small they were, how modest, how tame . . . except for the Lucian Freud.

I have been taking pleasure in pictures ever since. They represent for me an almost tactile satisfaction. I am the person leaning forward across the gallery rope to savour the particular sweep of the brush, to relish the juicy spread of oil or watercolour. Then I stand back to consider the order and shape, bounce back to re-examine the detail . . . I can be quite a menace at a private view, when everyone else is sipping wine and swapping gossip.

How was I to begin to make my choice for this exhibition? I chose to select artists I know who have given me particular insight into the subtle and pervasive power of images. Some hint at arcane and mysterious traces in the world of stone and sea; others articulate today's world with immediate and unwavering boldness, or shadowy suggestion.

At the open submission I found such diversity of subject, of style, and, it has to be said, of skill, that I was overwhelmed. Almost literally. By the end of the first day my eyes had feasted so much I went home and lay down with a cold compress on my forehead. The procession of pictures paraded for our judgement had called for a steady nerve and open heart. I tried to have both. I hope my consequent selection captures something of the range of taste that I enjoy and that others can share.

 

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