The National Gallery
Trafalgar Square, WC2.
Telephone: 020 7747 2885
The Gallery contains the Nation's outstanding permanent collection of Western European paintings from 1260 to 1920, including works by Rembrandt, Constable and Leonardo. The collection of around 2,300 paintings belongs to the British public, and entry to the main collection is free, although there are charges for entry to special exhibitions.
The National Gallery has grown to be a collection of international renown since its foundation in 1824. Every major development in painting from the Early Renaissance to the Post-impressionists is represented in its holdings, often by masterpieces.
Paintings in the National Gallery include:
Paolo Uccello, The Battle of San Romano
Piero della Francesca, The Baptism of Christ
Jan van Eyck, The Arnolfini Portrait
Sandro Botticelli, Venus and Mars
Leonardo da Vinci, The Virgin of the Rocks, The Burlington House Cartoon
Michelangelo, The Entombment, The Manchester Madonna
Raphael, Portrait of Pope Julius II, The Madonna of the Pinks
Titian, Bacchus and Ariadne
Hans Holbein the Younger, The Ambassadors
Agnolo Bronzino, Venus, Cupid, Folly and Time
Caravaggio, Boy Bitten by a Lizard, Supper at Emmaus, Salome with the
head of John the Baptist
Peter Paul Rubens, Le Chapeau de Paille, The Judgement of Paris (two
versions), Landscape with Het Steen
Anthony van Dyck, Equestrian Portrait of Charles I
Rembrandt, Belshazzar's Feast, two self portraits
Canaletto, A Regatta on the Grand Canal, The Stonemason's Yard
William Hogarth, Marriage a-la-Mode
George Stubbs, Whistlejacket
Thomas Gainsborough, Mr and Mrs Andrews
Joseph Wright of Derby, An Experiment on a Bird in the Air Pump
J. M. W. Turner, The Fighting Temeraire, Rain, Steam and Speed
John Constable, The Hay Wain
Claude Monet, The Water-Lily Pond, The Thames Below Westminster
Pierre-Auguste Renoir, The Umbrellas, Boating on the Seine
Vincent van Gogh, Sunflowers, Van Gogh's Chair
Trivia:
At the outbreak of World War II the paintings were exiled to safety in Manod Quarry, near the town of Ffestiniog in North Wales. Originally the director Kenneth Clark hoped to ship the paintings from Wales to Canada, but he received a telegram from Winston Churchill exhorting him to "bury them in caves or in cellars, but not a picture shall leave these islands"
Admission: Free (there is a charge for special exhibitions)
Open: Daily 10.00-18.00, Wed 10.00-21.00
Tube station(s): Charing Cross, Embankment, Leicester Square
Website: www.nationalgallery.org.uk
