Princess Diana named 'gay icon'

It’s official. The late great Princess Diana has been declared a ‘Gay Icon’.

A panel of esteemed British influential persons, including Sir Elton John, Jackie Kay, Billie Jean King and Sir Ian McKellen selected nominees for inclusion in The National Portrait Gallery’s Gay Icons show this summer. The late Princess Diana, Harvey Milk, k.d. Lang, Nelson Mandela and Ellen DeGeneres will all be represented in the photographic portrait exhibit.

The gallery is holding back the full list of honorees until closer to the opening, but it includes, “the artists Francis Bacon and David Hockney, the civil rights campaigner Harvey Milk, the writers Quentin Crisp, Joe Orton, Dame Daphne Du Maurier, Patricia Highsmith and Walt Whitman, and from the music world Tchaikovsky, k.d. lang, Rostropovich, Will Young and the Village People, the entertainers Ellen DeGeneres, Kenneth Williams and Lily Savage, and Mandela and Diana, Princess of Wales. Their stories will be illustrated by 60 photographic portraits including works by Andy Warhol, Linda McCartney, Lord Snowdon, Polly Borland, Fergus Greer, Terry O'Neill and Cecil Beaton.”

The exhibit will be an exercise in great diversity. As an organizer notes, “there's no such thing as a gay community any more than there's a straight community. Gay people are as disparate as any other group.” Therefore, the portraits range from straight people, to gay, and many “people who might be surprised to find themselves on a list of gay icons”.

The National Portrait Gallery revealed some expected names that will not be making the list. Noticeably absent from this collection are, "Joan Crawford, Mae West, Kylie Minogue, Dame Shirley Bassey, Oscar Wilde, Bette Midler, Marlene Dietrich, Joan Collins, Bette Davis, and Barbra Streisand. No Liberace or David Beckham."

The exhibition is set to coincide with the 40th anniversary of the Stonewall riots in New York.

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