National Portrait Gallery Names Ina Sarikhani Weston as New Chair

Event: Ina Sarikhani Weston elected new Chair of National Portrait Gallery

Venue: National Portrait Gallery

Location: St Martin's Place, London WC2H 0HE, UK

Dates: Effective October 2026

The National Portrait Gallery has elected Ina Sarikhani Weston as the new Chair of its Board of Trustees, with the appointment taking effect in October 2026. She succeeds Professor Shearer West, who has served as interim chair since October 2025.

A Curator and Collector's Route to the Chair

Sarikhani Weston brings an unusually wide-ranging background in art philanthropy and curatorship to the role. She is the co-founder, director and curator of The Sarikhani Collection, a body of Iranian art that supports loans, exhibitions, research projects, publications and academic posts. Her curatorial credits include Epic Iran at the Victoria and Albert Museum in 2021 and Iran: Five Thousand Years of Art at the James Simon Gallery in Berlin the following year. She currently sits on the Curatorial Committee of Positions at Photo London, extending her influence into the contemporary photography sector alongside her expertise in historical Iranian art.

Her institutional affiliations stretch well beyond the National Portrait Gallery. Sarikhani Weston is a founder member of the International Council of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and a Visiting Member of its Ancient Near Eastern Council. She chairs the Sarre Club, a committee connected to the Islamic Museum in Berlin, and holds trustee or fellowship positions at the Royal Academy of Arts and the Ashmolean Museum, alongside a role on the Development Board of the Wallace Collection. This dense network of affiliations situates her firmly within the upper tier of international museum philanthropy, a world where private collectors, trustees and curators frequently move between overlapping institutional roles.

From Trustee to Chair

Sarikhani Weston joined the National Portrait Gallery's Board as an ordinary Trustee on 26 January 2026, several months before assuming the chairmanship. That gap between the two appointments is not incidental. Serving first as a Trustee gave her direct experience of the Gallery's governance and priorities, before she took on the more senior role of Chair, which carries responsibility for setting strategy, leading Board meetings and representing the institution to major donors. The sequence reflects a familiar pattern in UK cultural governance, where trustees with proven track records in fundraising, collection-building and institutional diplomacy are gradually moved into leadership roles rather than recruited externally.

Philanthropy and Museum Governance

The appointment also reflects the increasingly significant role that private collectors and philanthropists play in sustaining Britain's national museums. As public funding for the arts remains constrained, institutions such as the National Portrait Gallery depend heavily on trustees who can combine curatorial credibility with access to philanthropic networks. Sarikhani Weston's marriage to Sir Guy Weston, chair of the Garfield Weston Foundation, one of the UK's largest charitable grant-making trusts, further underlines the intersection between personal wealth, family philanthropy and museum governance that increasingly defines the sector.

Continuity, Not Disruption

In his outgoing statement, Professor Shearer West described his time as interim chair as "a privilege," and said Sarikhani Weston would bring "experience, understanding and a collaborative approach" to the role. His comments point to continuity rather than disruption, suggesting that the Board views this transition as a natural progression rather than a response to any particular institutional difficulty.

For her part, Sarikhani Weston struck a note of engagement with the Gallery's current leadership rather than positioning herself as an agent of dramatic change. "I am honoured and delighted to have been elected as Chair," she said, "and I am excited to work with my fellow Trustees, Victoria Siddall, and the Gallery's exceptional team as we build on its recent successes and look towards a very promising future". Her explicit reference to Siddall, who became the National Portrait Gallery's first female director in 2024, signals an intention to work closely alongside existing leadership rather than assert independent authority over strategic direction.

What the Chair's Role Really Means

The Chair's role at a major national museum carries significant weight, even though it remains an unpaid, voluntary position. Trustees oversee financial governance and often serve as the public face of an institution's fundraising efforts among high-net-worth donors and philanthropic foundations. Sarikhani Weston's appointment therefore matters not simply because of her personal expertise in Iranian art, but because of what her extensive network of institutional relationships may bring to a gallery navigating a challenging funding environment for the arts.

Her tenure begins at a moment when the National Portrait Gallery is pursuing an active exhibition programme, including a major autumn presentation of fashion photographer Tim Walker's work opening in October, the same month Sarikhani Weston formally takes up her new role. Whether her chairmanship brings incremental continuity or a more distinct new direction will likely become clearer only once she has settled into the position alongside Siddall and the Gallery's trustees.

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