I am currently working on a forthcoming display to celebrate Sandra Lousada’s fifty-year career as a photographer and the National Portrait Gallery’s acquisition of an important group of her photographs. A selection of her work will be shown in the Bookshop Gallery from 28 November 2011– 20 May 2012.

Granddaughter of politician A P Herbert and daughter of stage designer Jocelyn Herbert, Sandra grew up amidst a circle of actors, writers, musicians and artists. From the 1950s and 1960s onwards, she recorded leading figures in the arts including Rita Tushingham and Paul Danquah on the set of A Taste of Honey (1961); Tom Courtenay on location for The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner (1962); and writers including Richard Hughes and Laurie Lee.

The Gallery’s acquisition also includes Sandra’s 1961 portrait of James Fox and Sarah Miles shortly before they appeared together in Joseph Losey’s multi-award winning film The Servant (1963).

James Fox and Sarah Miles by Sandra Lousada, 1961 © Sandra Lousada

More information can be found on Sandra’s website and a selection of her photographs can currently be seen in the Whitechapel Gallery display Rothko in Britain.