One day,painter Lucian Freud was reading the style magazine Dazed and Confused, edited at the time by Kate Moss's boyfriend, Jefferson Hack - in itself a slightly unexpected thing for such a senior artist to be doing - when he discovered an interview with the model. In this, she revealed that one of her remaining unfulfilled ambitions was to pose for Freud.
This might explain how Kate Moss became the subject of Naked Portrait 2002 - on which he was reportedly at work the night others were at a black-tie dinner in his honour at Tate Britain. She is perhaps the most famous person he has ever portrayed, with the exception of the Queen (and there may be sections of society in which the model is better known than the monarch).
Moss was also quoted as saying that although the painter was 80 years old, he was still very cool; which was quite right, except that he was only in his mid-seventies at the time (he turns 80 this December). From Freud's point of view, Moss was an unexpected choice of subject, because he has often said that the last thing he wants is a professional model. He wants to paint a real person, not a practised holder of poses. And there can scarcely be a more practised and professional model in the world than Kate Moss (unless it's the Queen, who must have posed for more portraits than anyone else alive).
But such a sitter perhaps presents a particular challenge: to discover a different person from the one who has been seen so often by the camera lens.
As reported today in the British press, the Freud painting certainly portrays an unfamiliar image of the supermodel. She is, as Freud often prefers with his subjects, completely naked. Her waif-like figure has been plumped up by pregnancy to almost Rubenesque rotundity (Freud tackled her midriff first so as to fix its form before it expanded further). She is seen, reclining on a bed, in steep recession so that her shins are the most prominent feature of her anatomy (which seldom happens in fashion shots).
The Kate Moss painting will be exposed in December at the Tate Britain Museum in London.
Update: Cathy points out that Moss isn't the first pregnant supermodel that Lucien Freud has portrayed, as this Jerry Hall 1997 proves. She notes: "Perhaps Freud would be better to adhere to his "ordinary people only" rule as he doesn't seem to have captured the spirit of either woman, when so many of his other images - although harsh, yes - have some charm".