For those of you who do not necessarily have the energy or inclination to go through the 232 pages of the New Year’s Honours, here are some highlights: CBEs for Tacita Dean, Yinka Shonibare and Gillian Wearing; OBEs to Sonia Boyce and Alison Wilding; and MBEs to Ann Dumas, the curator of many of the RAs best exhibitions (in my time, From Russia, The Real Van Gogh and Painting the Modern Garden) and Bryan Kneale, now aged 88, a student of the Royal Academy Schools from 1948 to 1952, elected an ARA in 1970, and curator of the exhibition of the exhibition British Sculptors in 1972.
Congratulations to them all (and doubtless many others I have missed).
| Charles | Saumarez | Smith | 
A very good trawl. Thank you for alerting me.
I’m particularly delighted that Tacita Dean has been recognised, quite rightly after her brilliant exhibitions this year. And Bryan Kneale.
Although not a visual artist, I’m very pleased that Michael Palin has been knighted. He’s been to Ledbury twice and is a really delightful, and modest, man.
Yes, I agree. Charles
I’m delighted that Philip Pullman has been knighted – his Daemon Voices, Essays on Storytelling is fascinating.
I wonder who proposed this –
‘One of the most unusual citations goes to Martin Frost, who receives an MBE for services to disappearing fore-edge painting. Frost, from Worthing, is reportedly the last commercial fore-edge painter, which involves painting an image on to the “stepped” incline of the edges of the pages of a book, which disappears when it is flat but comes alive as the pages are fanned’.
I’m delighted that Philip Pullman has been knighted – his Daemon Voices, Essays on Storytelling is fascinating.
I wonder who proposed this –
‘One of the most unusual citations goes to Martin Frost, who receives an MBE for services to disappearing fore-edge painting. Frost, from Worthing, is reportedly the last commercial fore-edge painter, which involves painting an image on to the “stepped” incline of the edges of the pages of a book, which disappears when it is flat but comes alive as the pages are fanned’.
These honours make it much the most interesting set of Honours for years.