Galleries

The National Gallery
Trafalgar Square ( www.nationalgallery.org.uk )
Tube: Leicester Square, Charing Cross or Leicester Square. Opening times and dates of temporary exhibitions see web site. Entry is free except for temporary exhibitions for which prices vary.

The gallery was founded in 1824 and is one of the world’s great galleries of west European painting.

The National Gallery,          Trafalgar Square London

Tate Britain  Millbank SW1  Tube: Pimlico
( www.tate.org.uk ) Open: 10 am - 5.50 pm daily Tours 11.30/2.30/3.30 Monday-Friday. Admission free. Special exhibitions vary.

Now that the sister gallery Tate Modern has opened a little down river there is more room to show their vast collection of British art from the 16th Century to the present day. Highlights include the JMW Turner collection and the Pre-Raphaelites

There are shuttle buses and boats between the two Tate Galleries.

Tate Britain Gallery

Tate Modern ( www.tate.org.uk ) is on the south bank of the Thames between the National Theatre and Shakespeare’s Globe theatre near to London Bridge. You can approach it from the Millenium Bridge which is a new footbridge from the north bank of the Thames not far to St Paul’s cathedral. Otherwise the nearest tubes are: Southwark, Waterloo or London Bridge. Open 10 am to 6 pm Mon - Thu & Sunday. Friday & Saturday 10 am 10 pm. Admission free except to special exhbitions.

The Tate Modern was converted from an electricity generaling station and so has vast proportions particularly in the entrance hall. `It is London’s leading museum of modern and contemporary art including post-impresssionism, abstract expressionism.

Millenium Bridge leading to the Tate Modern from St Paul’s cathedral

Courtauld Gallery Somerset House, Strand
( www,courtauld.ac.uk ) Opening hours visit web site Tube: Covent Garden, Holborn or Temple (Temple station is closed on Sundays)

The Gallery is housed in the beautiful Somerset House which dates from the 18th Century.  The Courtauld represents an amalgamation of several donated private collections. The heart of which are the paintings of Samuel Courtauld. This accounts for the bulk of Impressionist and post-Impressionists works. There are also Rubens paintings and a group of wonderful early Flemish and Italian paintings.

The Royal Observatory Greenwich