Posted by So following on from my previous London Museum posts British Museum and Odd One Out here I have a few interesting and lesser known facts about two extremely popular London museums, the National Gallery (top pics) and Tate Modern (bottom pics). The National Gallery, situated right on Trafalgar Square, is home to the national collection of art in the European tradition from the 13th to 19th centuries. As pictured it is home to one of the famous Sunflower paintings by Van Gogh as well as a host of other famous artists. The first paintings were donated by collector John Julius Angerstein in the early 1800’s. Following his donation artists bequeathed their own collections to the nation. The artist Turner for example, bequeathed over 1000 paintings upon his death. They came to the gallery in 1856. Today there are over 2300 works of art in the Gallery and they are all owned by the nation for the nation. The Gallery is free to enter. Tate Britain has only British artwork from 1500 to the present day, while Tate Modern has international modern and contemporary art. Here I have two examples from Tate Modern. Tate Britain and Tate Modern are also free entry.
Fun Fact: Opened in 2000, Tate Modern is housed within the old Bankside power station. You can still see where the turbines were on the lower floor. There is also a boiler house and a switch house. All have been converted to galleries or performance space.
For more info on museums, see my other posts, Odd One Out or British Museum
The Tate website here and the National Gallery website here have all the wonderful information.
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