A portrait that only looks like someone is not enough.

There’s been a lot of debate lately here in Denmark about what makes a portrait succeed or fail. It’s a good debate to have — because most people think the answer is simple: does it look like the person?

It isn’t. Or rather — likeness alone isn’t enough.

Art critics and portrait painters generally agree on three things a great portrait needs: enough likeness to be recognisable, the artist’s own interpretation, and the ability to work as a painting on its own terms — even if you’ve never seen the subject before.

But what separates good from great is something harder to name. The ability to reveal something true about a person that a photograph can’t capture. Not just how they look — but who they are.

There’s also an unspoken contract between artist and viewer. Choose realism, and you’ve made a promise: the proportions must hold. The anatomy must convince. When they don’t, people feel it — whether you’re an art expert or not.

One of Picasso’s portraits of Dora Maar barely resembles her. And yet it tells you something real about her that no photograph does.

A great portrait is not a record. It’s a presence.

That’s what we should be asking of any portrait — royal or otherwise.