Manchester Art Gallery is a free-to-view municipally-owned public
art galleryAn art gallery or art museum is a space for the exhibition of art, usually visual art.Museum can be public or private but what distinguishes a Museum is the ownership of a collection. Paintings are the most commonly displayed art objects; however, sculpture, photographs, illustrations,...
in
Manchester City CentreManchester city centre – known formally as City Centre – is the central business district of both Manchester and Greater Manchester, in North West England. The city centre, as defined by Manchester City Council, lies within the Manchester Inner Ring Road, straddling the River...
in the
North West of EnglandNorth West England is one of the nine official regions of England. It has a population of 6,853,200 and comprises five counties of England – Cumbria, Lancashire, Greater Manchester, Merseyside, and Cheshire....
.
The Gallery was extended by
Hopkins ArchitectsHopkins Architects is a prominent British architectural firm established in 1976 by Michael and Patricia Hopkins. The practice has won many awards for its work and has twice been shortlisted for the Stirling Prize, including in 2006 for Evelina Children's Hospital...
in May 2002 to take in the old Atheneaum building next door, and now occupies three buildings. One building is the Grade I listed building that was originally the
Royal Manchester InstitutionThe Royal Manchester Institution was an English learned society founded on 1 October 1823 at a public meeting held in the Exchange Room by Manchester merchants, local artists and others keen to dispel the image of Manchester as a city lacking in culture and taste.The Institution was housed in a...
designed by Sir
Charles BarrySir Charles Barry FRS was an English architect, best known for his role in the rebuilding of the Palace of Westminster in his home city of London during the mid 19th century, but also responsible for numerous other buildings and gardens.-Training:Born in Bridge Street, Westminster, he was the son...
in 1824.
The gallery houses the civic art collection of
ManchesterManchester is a city and metropolitan borough of Greater Manchester, England. In 2007, the population of the city was estimated to be 458,100...
.
Manchester Art Gallery is a free-to-view municipally-owned public
art galleryAn art gallery or art museum is a space for the exhibition of art, usually visual art.Museum can be public or private but what distinguishes a Museum is the ownership of a collection. Paintings are the most commonly displayed art objects; however, sculpture, photographs, illustrations,...
in
Manchester City CentreManchester city centre – known formally as City Centre – is the central business district of both Manchester and Greater Manchester, in North West England. The city centre, as defined by Manchester City Council, lies within the Manchester Inner Ring Road, straddling the River...
in the
North West of EnglandNorth West England is one of the nine official regions of England. It has a population of 6,853,200 and comprises five counties of England – Cumbria, Lancashire, Greater Manchester, Merseyside, and Cheshire....
.
The Gallery was extended by
Hopkins ArchitectsHopkins Architects is a prominent British architectural firm established in 1976 by Michael and Patricia Hopkins. The practice has won many awards for its work and has twice been shortlisted for the Stirling Prize, including in 2006 for Evelina Children's Hospital...
in May 2002 to take in the old Atheneaum building next door, and now occupies three buildings. One building is the Grade I listed building that was originally the
Royal Manchester InstitutionThe Royal Manchester Institution was an English learned society founded on 1 October 1823 at a public meeting held in the Exchange Room by Manchester merchants, local artists and others keen to dispel the image of Manchester as a city lacking in culture and taste.The Institution was housed in a...
designed by Sir
Charles BarrySir Charles Barry FRS was an English architect, best known for his role in the rebuilding of the Palace of Westminster in his home city of London during the mid 19th century, but also responsible for numerous other buildings and gardens.-Training:Born in Bridge Street, Westminster, he was the son...
in 1824.
The gallery houses the civic art collection of
ManchesterManchester is a city and metropolitan borough of Greater Manchester, England. In 2007, the population of the city was estimated to be 458,100...
. As well as art of international significance, there are many works specifically related to Manchester (especially in the CIS-sponsored Manchester Room).
One very significant collection in the gallery is of works by
Pierre Adolphe ValettePierre Adolphe Valette was a French Impressionist painter. His most acclaimed paintings are urban landscapes of Manchester, now in the collection of Manchester Art Gallery. Today, he is chiefly remembered as L. S...
. Valette was a French
impressionistImpressionism was a 19th-century art movement that began as a loose association of Paris-based artists whose independent exhibitions brought them to prominence in the 1870s and 1880s...
who painted and taught in Manchester in the early years of the C20th. Valette's reputation is growing, and in the Manchester Art Gallery it is not difficult to see the immediate appeal of the impressionist scenes of foggy Manchester streets and canals. A
CézannePaul Cézanne was a French artist and Post-Impressionist painter whose work laid the foundations of the transition from the 19th century conception of artistic endeavour to a new and radically different world of art in the 20th century...
hangs in the same room, and it is quite a shock to see the similarity in treatment and subject between Cézanne's misty French river bridge and a particular river bridge in the pre-
Clean Air ActThe Clean Air Act 1956 was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom passed in response to London's Great Smog of 1952. It was in effect between 1955 and 1964, and sponsored by the Ministry of Housing and Local Government in England and the Department of Health for Scotland.The Act introduced...
Mancunian fog. One very important fact about Valette is that
L. S. LowryLaurence Stephen Lowry was an English artist born in Barrett Street, Stretford, Lancashire. Many of his drawings and paintings depict nearby Salford and surrounding areas, including Pendlebury, where he lived and worked for over 40 years at 117 Station Road, opposite St...
was one of his pupils: the influence on Lowry of impressionism, via Valette, is immediately obvious here, where pictures by the two artists hang together.
The museum also houses
The Picnic (1908), an important work by the British Impressionist painter
Wynford DewhurstWynford Dewhurst, R.B.A. was an English Impressionist painter and important writer on art. He spent considerable time in France and his work was profoundly influenced by Claude Monet.-Biography:Wynford Dewhurst was born in Manchester in 1864...
, who was born in Manchester.
As well as its paintings, the museum holds important collections of glass, silverware and furniture, including two important pieces by the Victorian art-architect
William BurgesWilliam Burges was an English architect and designer. The greatest of the Victorian art-architects, Burges sought in his work an escape from 19th century industrialisation and a return to the values, architectural and social, of an imagined mediaeval England...
.
Paintings
Dutch School
- Backhuysen, Ludolf - 1 painting;
- Borch, Gerard ter
Gerard ter Borch was a Dutch genre painter, who lived in the Dutch Golden Age.-Biography:Gerard ter Borch was born in December 1617 in Zwolle in the province of Overijssel in the Dutch Republic....
- 2 paintings;
- Brekelenkam, Quirijn van
Quirijn or Quiringh Gerritsz van Brekelenkam , was a Dutch Baroque genre painter. He probably studied under Gerard Dou, and as a result his paintings from the 1640s and 1650s are similar to those of the Leiden fijnschilders.-References:* Elizabeth Alice Honig, "Brekelenkam, Quiringh [Quirijn] ...
- 2 paintings;
- Cuyp, Aelbert
Aelbert Jacobsz Cuyp was one of the leading Dutch landscape painters of the Dutch Golden Age in the 17th century. The most famous of a family of painters, the pupil of his father Jacob Gerritsz...
- 2 paintings;
- Dou, Gerrit - 1 painting;
- Heem, Jan Janszoon de
Jan Janszoon de Heem was a Dutch Golden Age still-life painter and the son of Jan Davidszoon de Heem and the brother of Cornelis de Heem...
- 1 painting;
- Hobbema, Meyndert - 1 painting;
- Hooch, Pieter de
Pieter de Hooch was a genre painter during the Dutch Golden Age. He was a contemporary of Dutch Master Jan Vermeer, with whom his work shared themes and style.-Biography:...
- 2 paintings;
- Ochtervelt, Jacob - 2 paintings;
- Ostade, Adriaen van
Adriaen van Ostade was a Dutch genre painter.-Life:He was the eldest son of Jan Hendricx Ostade, a weaver from the town of Ostade near Eindhoven...
- 1 painting;
- Ruysdael, Salomon van - 2 paintings;
- Snyders, Frans - 1 painting;
- Sorgh, Hendrik Martenszoon
Hendrik Martenszoon Sorgh , was a Dutch Golden Age painter of genre works.-Biography:He was a pupil of David Teniers the Younger and Willem Pieterszoon Buytewech. Sorgh painted mostly interiors with peasants. His kitchen interiors feature elaborate still lifes...
- 2 paintings;
- Steen, Jan
Jan Havickszoon Steen was a Dutch genre painter of the 17th century . Psychological insight, sense of humour and abundance of colour are marks of his trade.-Life:...
- 1 painting;
- Velde, Adriaen van de - 1 painting;
- Velde the Younger, Willem van de
Willem van de Velde the Younger was a Dutch marine painter.-Biopgraphy:Willem van de Velde was baptised on 18 December 1633 in Leiden, Holland, Dutch Republic....
- 2 paintings;
English School
- Beechey, William
Sir Henry William Beechey , English portrait-painter, was born at Burford, the son of William Beechey and Hannah Read ....
- 2 paintings;
- Constable, John
John Constable was an English Romantic painter. Born in Suffolk, he is known principally for his landscape paintings of Dedham Vale, the area surrounding his home—now known as "Constable Country"—which he invested with an intensity of affection...
- 1 painting;
- Gainsborough, Thomas
Thomas Gainsborough was one of the most famous portrait and landscape painters of 18th century Britain.-Suffolk:...
- 10 paintings;
- Hogarth, William
William Hogarth was a major English painter, printmaker, pictorial satirist, social critic and editorial cartoonist who has been credited with pioneering western sequential art. His work ranged from excellent realistic portraiture to comic strip-like series of pictures called "modern moral...
- 2 paintings;
- Kneller, Sir Godfrey - 1 paintings;
- Landseer, Sir Edwin
Sir Edwin Henry Landseer, RA was an English painter, well known for his paintings of animals—particularly horses, dogs and stags...
- 3 paintings;
- Lawrence, Thomas
Sir Thomas Lawrence RA was a notable English painter, mostly of portraits.He was born in Bristol. His father was an innkeeper, first at Bristol and afterwards at Devizes, and at the age of six Lawrence was already being shown off to the guests of the Bear as an infant prodigy who could sketch...
- 1 painting;
- Lely, Peter
Sir Peter Lely was a painter of Dutch origin, whose career was nearly all spent in England, where he became the dominant portrait painter to the court.-Life:...
- 1 painting;
- Reynolds, Joshua
Sir Joshua Reynolds RA FRS FRSA was an important and influential 18th century English painter, specialising in portraits and promoting the "Grand Style" in painting which depended on idealisation of the imperfect. He was one of the founders and first President of the Royal Academy...
- 4 paintings;
- Souch, John
John Souch was an English portrait painter. He flourished in the early seventeenth century in the North West of England, and perhaps epitomises the role of art in English local life at that time.- Early life :...
- 1 painting;
- Stubbs, George
George Stubbs was a British painter, best known for his paintings of horses.-Biography:Stubbs was born in Liverpool, the son of a currier and leather merchant. Information on his life up to age thirty-five is sparse, relying almost entirely on notes made by fellow artist Ozias Humphry towards the...
- 1 paintings;
- Turner, J. M. W. - 1 painting;
- Valette, Pierre Adolphe
Pierre Adolphe Valette was a French Impressionist painter. His most acclaimed paintings are urban landscapes of Manchester, now in the collection of Manchester Art Gallery. Today, he is chiefly remembered as L. S...
- 5 paintings;
Flemish School
- Francken the Younger, Frans
Frans Francken the Younger , was a Flemish Baroque painter and the best-known member of the large Francken family of artists. Many of his works are small historical, allegorical and biblical cabinet paintings with the focus on figures...
- 1 painting;
- Teniers the Younger, David
David Teniers the Younger , a Flemish artist born in Antwerp, was the more celebrated son of David Teniers the Elder, almost ranking in celebrity with Rubens and Van Dyck. His son David Teniers III and his grandson David Teniers IV were also painters...
- 3 paintings;
French School
- Corot, Jean-Baptiste Camille - 2 painting;
- Degas, Edgar
Edgar Degas
[p] , born Hilaire-Germain-Edgar De Gas , was a French artist famous for his work in painting, sculpture, printmaking and drawing. He is regarded as one of the founders of Impressionism although he rejected the term, and preferred to be called a realist...
- 1 painting;
- Dughet, Gaspard
Gaspard Dughet was a French painter.A pupil of Nicolas Poussin, Gaspard Dughet was the brother of Poussin's wife...
- 1 painting;
- Gauguin, Eugène Henri Paul
Eugène Henri Paul Gauguin was a leading Post-Impressionist painter. His bold experimentation with colouring led directly to the Synthetist style of modern art while his expression of the inherent meaning of the subjects in his paintings, under the influence of the cloisonnist style, paved the way...
- 1 painting;
- Gellée, Claude
Claude Lorrain, traditionally just Claude in English was an artist of the Baroque era who was active in Italy, and is admired for his achievements in landscape painting.-Early years:Lorrain was born in 1604 or 1605 into poverty in the town of Champagne, Vosges...
- 1 painting;
- Pissarro, Camille
Camille Pissarro was a French Impressionist painter. His importance resides not only in his visual contributions to Impressionism and Post-Impressionism, but also in his patriarchal standing among his colleagues, particularly Paul Cézanne and Paul Gauguin.-Early life and work:Jacob-Abraham-Camille...
- 1 painting;
- Renoir, Pierre Auguste - 1 painting;
- Vernet, Claude-Joseph - 1 painting;
German School
- Zoffany, Johan
Johann Zoffany, Zoffani or Zauffelij was a German neoclassical painter, active mainly in England. His works appear in many prominent British national galleries such as the National Gallery, London and the Tate Gallery.Zoffany was born in Frankfurt. He came to Britain to enjoy the patronage of the...
- 1 painting;
Italian School
- Daddi, Bernardo
Bernardo Daddi was an early Italian renaissance painter and apprentice of Giotto. He was also influenced by the Sienese art of Lorenzetti....
- 1 painting;
- Giordano, Luca
Luca Giordano was an Italian late Baroque painter and printmaker in etching.-Early life and training:...
- 1 painting;
- Mura, Francesco de
Francesco de Mura was an Italian painter of the late-Baroque period, active mainly in Naples and Turin. His late work reflects the style of neoclassicism....
- 1 painting;
- Reni, Guido
Guido Reni was an Italian painter of high-Baroque style.-Biography:Born in Bologna into a family of musicians, Guido Reni was the son of Daniele Reni and Ginevra de’ Pozzi. As a child of nine, he was apprenticed under the Bolognese studio of Denis Calvaert. Soon after, he was joined in that...
- 1 painting;
- Turchi, Alessandro
Alessandro Turchi was an Italian painter of the early Baroque, born and active mainly in Verona, and moving late in life to Rome. He also went by the name Alessandro Veronese or the nickname L'Obetto....
- 1 painting;
- Zuccarelli, Francesco
Francesco Zuccarelli was an Italian Rococo painter.He was born at Pitigliano, in southern Tuscany, where he initially apprenticed with Paolo Anesi...
- 1 painting;
Hungarian School
- Wagner, Alexander von
Alexander originally Sándor von Wagner was a Hungarian painter.- Biography :Wagner was born in Pesth. After graduating from the Real-Gymnasium in his hometown at the age of nineteen, he entered the Academy of Fine Arts at Vienna, where he was a student of Henrik Weber...
- 1 painting
See also
- Grade I listed buildings in Greater Manchester
-See also:*Architecture of Manchester*Conservation in the United Kingdom*Grade II* listed buildings in Greater Manchester*List of tallest buildings in Manchester*Scheduled Monuments in Greater Manchester-Bibliography:...
- Grade II* listed buildings in Greater Manchester
External links