LONDON, ENGLAND.-New research has taken place on a portrait of a young man which throughout the twentieth century has had numerous champions expressing the hope it is of William Shakespeare. The original inscription painted above the man's head records the sitter's age as 24 in 1588 making him an exact contemporary of Shakespeare. In preparation for its Searching for Shakespeare exhibition next year, the National Portrait Gallery has painstakingly restored the portrait to enable exhibition visitors to see it as it would have appeared in the late sixteenth century. The painting had suffered some damage and a number of losses, including significant woodworm damage to the left side of the picture. Viewers of BBC TWO's The Culture Show tonight (Thursday) will be able to compare the portrait before and after restoration.

On loan to the exhibition from the John Rylands University Library, The University of Manchester, The Grafton Portrait shows a rather beautiful youth with curly brown hair and grey eyes, wearing a sumptuous slashed scarlet doublet, painted in such a way as to depict silk or satin. As a portrait of an angelic faced young man, this picture has fuelled interest in romantic notions of Shakespeare's youth prior to his life as an established playwright. Today there are those who support this view including Peter Ackroyd, the writer of the new book Shakespeare: The Biography. However, the John Rylands University Library which now owns the portrait does not uphold the identification of this painting as of Shakespeare.

Technical analysis undertaken at the National Portrait Gallery has confirmed a late-sixteenth-century date, as well as an English origin for this picture. The technical examination focused upon confirming the date of the panel, and exploring an obvious adjustment applied to the last digit of the inscription from 23 to 24. The change in the lettering from 23 to 24 was confirmed through the use of paint sampling as contemporary with the rest of the picture, which indicates that the young man had probably passed his 24th birthday by the time the painting was complete and requested his age be altered. It has not been possible to identify a specific artist, but the handling of the painting is in line with a controlled linear technique of English artists of the late sixteenth century. The Grafton Portrait acquired its name in the early 20th century, when the owners recalled an old family tradition that the portrait had been bequeathed by one of the Dukes of Grafton to their ancestor, a yeoman farmer in the village of Grafton, Northamptonshire five or six generations previously.

The technical analysis and conservation work is part of a research programme being undertaken by the National Portrait Gallery on three of six portraits which have at some time been associated with Shakespeare's identity and will be displayed together in the Searching for Shakespeare exhibition for the first time. In a three-part series of films BBC TWO's The Culture Show has already revealed details of the research on the Flower Portrait belonging to the Royal Shakespeare Company and the final programme to be shown shortly before the opening of the exhibition will focus on the National Portrait Gallery's own Chandos Portrait.

Searching for Shakespeare (2 March - 29 May 2006) will bring together original documents artefacts and costumes relating to Shakespeare's life together with portraits of his contemporaries including actors, patrons and other dramatists, in order to place the poet not in our historical imagination, but within his own time. The exhibition will be one of two celebrating the National Portrait Gallery's 150th Anniversary. The Chandos Portrait was the first portrait acquired by the Gallery in 1856. The exhibition will tour to the Yale Center for British Art, New Haven from 24 June-17 September 2006.