Neil Shawcross is waxing lyrical about True Tales of American Life, an anthology of ‘true stories that sounded like fiction’ collected by Paul Auster. He calls them ‘amazing’ and adds that the short story is one of his favourite modes of writing.

The renowned portraitist has an obvious interest in the written word: an example of which is hanging on the walls of the Naughton Gallery at Queen’s for anyone to see. Larger than life watercolour interpretations of beloved Penguin book covers in vivid blues, yellows and oranges, unveiled in honour of Penguin’s 75th anniversary.

Shawcross’s current exhibition, Penguins, is a collection that has been 20 years in the making. ‘I’m fascinated with it,’ says the artist, pointing to the image below. ‘It was bound to be that way. Working on it for that length of time, I assume I was getting better and better?’

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