Sir Paul McCartney: 'Unearthing Beatles photos made me emotional'

Rediscovering a set of photos Sir Paul McCartney took in the early days of The Beatles left him "instantly flooded with memories and emotions".

Sir Paul took the images during "an intense three-month period of travel" in 1963 and 1964 but believed they had been lost.

He said unearthing them had "plunged" him "right back" into the experience.

The photos will be shown at the National Portrait Gallery as part of its relaunch and published in a book.

Paul McCartney Photographs 1963-64: Eyes of the Storm will run between 28 June and 1 October as one of two major exhibitions that will launch the London gallery's summer programme.

The images document December 1963 to February 1964, a period which was an important one for the Liverpool band, taking in their meteoric rise to global superstardom, their record-breaking appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show and the four-piece's youngest member George Harrison's 21st birthday.

Sir Paul said he rediscovered about 1,000 images in his archive, which were taken on a 35mm camera and document the "pandemonium" the band witnessed as they travelled through Liverpool, London, Paris, New York, Washington, D.C. and Miami.

"Anyone who rediscovers a personal relic or family treasure is instantly flooded with memories and emotions, which then trigger associations buried in the haze of time," he said.

"This was exactly my experience in seeing these photos, all taken over an intense three-month period of travel.

"It was a wonderful sensation to be plunged right back."

He added that the photos were "my own record of our first huge trip".

"[They are] a photographic journal of The Beatles in six cities, beginning in Liverpool and London, followed by Paris - where John and I had been ordinary hitchhikers three years before - and then what we regarded as the big time, our first visit as a group to America," he said.

A selection of the photos will be shown in the gallery, while 275 will be included in a book, titled 1964: Eyes of the Storm.

Gallery director Dr Nicholas Cullinan said they were "really extraordinary".

He said Sir Paul's exhibition was "very interesting".

"[He] approached us... back in 2020 and said he had found these photographs which he remembered taking but thought had been lost," he said.

"We sat down with him and began going through the photographs and they are really extraordinary."

He said to be able to look at the previously unseen images of "such a well-documented, such a famous and important cultural moment" was amazing, particularly because they were "taken by someone who was really, as the exhibition title alludes, in the eye of the storm, looking outside at what was happening".

The gallery, which has been closed since 2020 to refurbish the building, redisplay the collection, create new gallery spaces and improve access with a new entrance, will also host Yevonde: Life and Colour from 22 June to 15 October, an exhibition which will explore the life and career of the 20th Century colour-photography pioneer Yevonde.

It reopens on 22 June.

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