An exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery Below Stairs: 400 years of Servants Portraits looks at the images of those who cleaned, cooked, nursed and gardened for their so called betters.
The masters of the houses were the ones most likely to commission the portraits, although women were the subjects of many of them.
Corinne Julius spoke to cultural historian Alison Light and the exhibition's co-curator Anne French about the reasons behind painting servants. But first she went to Holkham Hall in Norfolk, the home of the Earl and Countess of Leicester, who as part of their millennium project are having all the staff painted by artist Andrew Festing.
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