Britain: An official handbook > 1993

PROMOTION OF THE ARTS
Victoria and Albert Museum (V&A), the
Science Museum, the National Gallery, the
Tate Gallery, the National Portrait Gallery,
the Imperial War Museum, the National
Army Museum, the Royal Air Force
Museum, the National Maritime Museum,
the Wallace Collection, the Geological
Museum and the National Museums and
Galleries on Merseyside. An extension to the
National Gallery, the Sainsbury Wing,
opened in 1991. A gift from the Sainsbury
family, it provides a venue for major
international touring exhibitions and other
events.
Some of the museums in London have
branches in the regions, examples being the
National Railway Museum (York) and the
National Museum of Photography, Film and
Television (Bradford), which are part of the
Science Museum. The Tate Gallery opened a
branch in Liverpool in 1988, and is planning
to open another in St Ives, Cornwall, while
the V&A plans to open a branch in Bradford.
A purpose-built museum to house much of
the Royal Armouries collection is planned to
open in Leeds’s Clarence Dock in 1996 and
the Imperial War Museum is to open a
branch in Hartlepool, Teesside.
Some of the national museums’ and
galleries’ acquisitions in 1991 include:
• Snettisham treasure trove: the
largest hoard of gold and silver
ever found in Britain—British
Museum;
• the Scott Johnson collection of
Japanese illustrated books and
albums—British Museum;
• Rain, by Howard Hodgkin—Tate
Gallery;
• The Lord Sandwich Papers—
National Maritime Museum; and
• Ulysses Shooting through the Ring,
by Francesco Primaticcio—
National Museums and Galleries
on Merseyside.
In Scotland the national collections are
held by the National Museums of Scotland
and the National Galleries of Scotland. The
National Museums of Scotland include the
Royal Museum of Scotland and the Scottish
United Services Museum, both in Edinburgh;
the Museum of Flight, near North Berwick;
the Scottish Agricultural Museum, at
Ingliston; and the Shambellie House Museum
of Costume, near Dumfries. A new Museum
of Scotland is to be built next to the Royal
Museum to house the National Museums’
Scottish collection. The National Galleries of
Scotland comprise the National Gallery of
Scotland, the Scottish National Portrait
Gallery and the Scottish National Gallery of
Modern Art.
The National Museum of Wales (where a
major expansion scheme is in progress), in
Cardiff, has a number of branches including
the Welsh Folk Museum at St Fagans; the
Industrial and Maritime Museum in Cardiff s
dockland; Amgueddfa’r Gogledd (the Slate
Museum) at Llanberis; and the Museum of
the Woollen Industry at Drefach Velindre.
Northern Ireland has two national museums:
the Ulster Museum in Belfast and the Ulster
Folk and Transport Museum in County
Down.
Other Collections
Other important collections in London
include the Royal Armouries in the Tower of
London, the Museum of London, Sir John
Soane’s Museum, the Courtauld collection
and the London Transport Museum. The
Queen’s Gallery in Buckingham Palace has
exhibitions of pictures from the extensive
royal collections.
Most cities and towns have museums
devoted to art, archaeology and natural
history, usually administered by the local
authorities but sometimes by local learned
societies or by individuals or trustees. Both
Oxford and Cambridge are rich in museums.
Many are associated with their universities,
such as the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford
(founded in 1683—the oldest in the world),
and the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge.
Many private art collections in historic family
mansions, including those owned by the
National Trusts, are open to the public, while
an increasing number of open air museums
depict the regional life of an area or preserve
early industrial remains. These include the
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