No other nation has contributed more to the shaping of American history and culture than Great Britain. In part because of this special relationship, no other foreign country has been featured as often on TIME's cover. This week, as part of TIME's 60th anniversary, an exhibition of its 233 covers on British personalities and events opens at the Royal Festival Hall in London. Titled "Britain 1923-1983: an American View," the exposition traces U.S. perspectives on the pomp, politics and art of our closest ally.

Among the covers displayed are 77 political figures, 31 members of royalty, 23 on the military, 60 writers, artists and entertainers. Others include Captain Illingworth, master of the Queen Mary (1947), and Racing Car Driver Jim Clark (1965). The first British subject to appear on TIME's cover (its sixth, in April 1923) was Polish-born Writer Joseph Conrad, a naturalized Briton. One week later Winston Churchill was on the first of his eight covers. Queen Elizabeth II, who has graced TIME's cover nine times, more than any of her countrymen, made her bow as a three-year-old toddler. Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher has been pictured six times, most recently after the general election last June.

Like other expositions of TIME covers, which have been held in such cities as Boston, Philadelphia, Washington and Paris, the London exhibit provides a kaleidoscopic survey of 20th century magazine portraiture. TIME's early black-and-white covers gave way in the late 1920s to full-color photographs and a red border. Formal pen-and-ink drawings are followed in the 1960s and '70s by the Pop posters of Lichtenstein, the wicked caricatures of David Levine and the papier-mache grotesques created by British Artist Gerald Scarfe (whose TIME covers include not only the Beatles but such non-British subjects as John Kenneth Galbraith and Nelson Rockefeller). Most of the original art for the London exposition was lent back to TIME by the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, D.C. In 1978 TIME gave its covers to the gallery, and continues to add to this permanent collection. The royal family, which keeps three TIME cover portraits at Buckingham Palace (including two of the Queen), sent a painting of Princess Margaret featured in 1947 to the London show.

In an introduction to the London exhibit, Time Inc. Editor in Chief Henry Grunwald notes: "The cover story on an individual is an expression of TIME's belief that news and history are made by people and best told through them." This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so viewer discretion is required.