A LARGER THAN LIFE PORTRAIT OF Helena Rubinstein, the first self-made multi-millionairess of modern times – and an Australian resident in her formative years – has today been unveiled at  the National Portrait Gallery.

Supported by  three equal partners in the in the purchase, founding patron Marilyn Darling, founding benefactor Tim Fairfax, and the Sid and Fiona Myer Family Foundation, the 1957 portrait by Graham Sutherland shows the creator of the first publicly-listed global cosmetics corporation that began in Melbourne resplendent in a red brocade Balenciaga gown.

Rubinstein, who  emigrated from Poland to Australia in 1902 penniless,  was a businesswoman with a natural entrepreneurial instinct who opened a salon in fashionable Collins Street, Melbourne, later marrying a Polish American journalist and moving to the international sphere.

The portrait formerly belonged to Rubinstein herself, and US reflects her own personal glamour. Passed at her death to the Helena Rubinstein Foundation in New York who wound up their operations in 2011. It was then sold at Sotheby’s and was acquired by the London dealer Daniel Katz, from whom the National Portrait Gallery has now secured it for its Canberra collection.

The National Portrait Gallery,  King Edward Terrace,  Parkes, Canberra, 10am–5pm daily.