May 10: The National Gallery

The National Gallery in London opened in 1824. Here's the lowdown on the gallery:

1. The National Gallery is situated in Trafalgar Square in central London and houses a collection of over 2,300 paintings.
2. It started when the British government bought 38 paintings from the heirs of John Julius Angerstein, an insurance broker and patron of the arts. There had been opportunities to buy art collections before this - Sir Robert Walpole's collection was one. An MP, John Wilkes, was keen to buy the collection and start a national collection but it never happened.
3. Angerstein's collection cost £57,000 and was funded by the repayment of a war debt by Austria.
4. The current building is the third to house the collection. The first was Angerstein's house in Pall Mall. While it was no doubt a substantial house, it wasn't really big enough to house a growing national art collection. It was dark, dingy and often too hot. When subsidence made it necessary to move, initially the collection only moved a few doors down Pall Mall, to an equally unsuitable house.
5. When that house had to be demolished to build a new road, the current location was selected. While there were concerns about a central London location and pollution and that the building, designed by William Wilkins, wasn't ideal, the fact that Trafalgar Square was a convenient location for both the West and East sides of London and therefore accessible to all social classes swung the balance in its favour.
6. Accessibility remains key. Visiting the gallery is still free of charge today. In 2015 5,908,254 people visited.
7. At time of writing, the Director of the National Gallery is Gabriele Finaldi.
8. Just before the Second World War the paintings were evacuated to Wales. At first, they were housed in colleges and castles, but as war raged in Europe, it became clear this arrangement might not be secure enough. There was talk of shipping the collection to Canada, but Winston Churchill objected. He sent a telegram to the director Kenneth Clark, saying “bury them in caves or in cellars, but not a picture shall leave these islands”. So the paintings were squirrelled away in a slate quarry at Manod, near Blaenau Ffestiniog in North Wales, along with the gallery's library. Meanwhile, back in London the empty gallery was used for daily lunch time music recitals,
9. The Rokeby Venus by Diego Valesquez was slashed by a suffragette, Mary Richardson, who smuggled a meat cleaver into the Gallery.
10. The mosaic in the entrance hall is by Boris Anrep and the subject is the The Awakening of the Muses. It includes portraits of Virginia Woolf and Greta Garbo. His take on the virtues includes "Humour" and "Open Mind" and features portraits of Winston Churchill, Bertrand Russell and T. S. Eliot.

Other Museums and galleries in London

British Museum
Natural History Museum
Victoria and Albert Museum

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