Manchester Art Gallery

Manchester Art Gallery
Manchester City Art Gallery, Mosley Street
General information
Location	Mosley Street, City Centre, Manchester, England, United Kingdom
Completed	1824
Design and construction
Architect	Sir Charles Barry

Manchester Art Gallery is a publicly-owned art gallery in Manchester, England. It was formerly known as Manchester City Art Gallery. The gallery was opened in 1824 and today occupies three buildings, the oldest of which - designed by Sir Charles Barry - is Grade I listed^[1] and was originally home to the Royal Manchester Institution. The gallery was extended by Hopkins Architects in 2002 to take in the Manchester Athenaeum, designed in the Palazzo style by Barry in 1826. The gallery is free to enter and houses the civic art collection, which includes works of local and international significance.

Architecture

The two-storey gallery, designed by Barry, is built in rusticated ashlar to a rectangular in plan on a raised plinth. The roof is hidden by a continuous dentilled cornice and plain parapet. Its eleven-bay facade has two three-bay side ranges and a central five-bay pedimented projecting portico with six Ionic columns. Set back behind the parapet is an attic with small windows that forms a lantern above the entrance hall.^[1]

Collections

The Italianate Athenaeum building (Sir Charles Barry, architect, 1826) part of the Manchester Art Gallery facing Princess Street

The Manchester Art Gallery is strong in its representation of the English school, with works by Thomas Gainsborough and the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood.

The gallery houses several works by the French impressionist Pierre Adolphe Valette who painted and taught in Manchester in the early years of the 20th century and some of his scenes of foggy Manchester streets and canals are displayed. A Cézanne hangs in the same room, showing the similarity in treatment and subject between his misty French river bridge and Valette's bridge in a pre-Clean Air Act Mancunian fog. L. S. Lowry was one of Valette's students and the influence on Lowry of impressionism can be seen at the gallery, where paintings by the two artists hang together.

The museum houses The Picnic (1908), a work by the British Impressionist painter Wynford Dewhurst, who was born in Manchester.

As well as paintings, the museum holds collections of glass, silverware and furniture – including two pieces by the Victorian reformist architect and designer William Burges.

Collection

The Good Samaritan by G F Watts framed by doorways

Paintings

Dutch School

• Backhuysen, Ludolf - 1 painting;
• Borch, Gerard ter - 2 paintings;
• Brekelenkam, Quirijn van - 2 paintings;
• Jan van de Cappelle -3 paintings
• Cuyp, Aelbert - 2 paintings;
• Dou, Gerrit - 1 painting;
• Heem, Jan Janszoon de - 1 painting;
• Hobbema, Meyndert - 1 painting;
• Hooch, Pieter de - 2 paintings;
• Ochtervelt, Jacob - 2 paintings;
• Ostade, Adriaen van - 1 painting;
• Ruysdael, Salomon van - 2 paintings;
• Snyders, Frans - 1 painting;
• Sorgh, Hendrik Martenszoon - 2 paintings;
• Steen, Jan - 1 painting;
• Velde, Adriaen van de - 1 painting;
• Velde the Younger, Willem van de - 2 paintings;

Charles Mengin (1877) Sappho

Wynford Dewhurst - The Picnic (1908)

English School

• Beechey, William - 2 paintings;
• Constable, John - 1 painting;
• Gainsborough, Thomas - 10 paintings;
• Hogarth, William - 2 paintings;
• Kneller, Sir Godfrey - 1 paintings;
• Landseer, Sir Edwin - 3 paintings;
• Lawrence, Thomas - 1 painting;
• Lely, Peter - 1 painting;
• Lowry, L. S. - 1 painting;
• Reynolds, Joshua - 4 paintings;
• Souch, John - 1 painting;
• Stubbs, George - 1 paintings;
• Turner, J. M. W. - 1 painting;
• Valette, Pierre Adolphe - 5 paintings;

Flemish School

• Francken the Younger, Frans - 1 painting;
• Teniers the Younger, David - 3 paintings;

French School

• Corot, Jean-Baptiste Camille - 2 paintings;
• Degas, Edgar - 1 painting;
• Dughet, Gaspard - 1 painting;
• Gauguin, Eugène Henri Paul - 1 painting;
• Gellée, Claude - 1 painting;
• Mengin, Charles - 1 painting;
• Pissarro, Camille - 1 painting;
• Renoir, Pierre Auguste - 1 painting;
• Vernet, Claude-Joseph - 1 painting;

German School

• Zoffany, Johan - 1 painting;

Italian School

• Daddi, Bernardo - 1 painting;
• Giordano, Luca - 1 painting;
• Mura, Francesco de - 1 painting;
• Reni, Guido - 1 painting;
• Turchi, Alessandro - 1 painting;
• Zuccarelli, Francesco - 1 painting;
• Giovanni Ansaldo - 1 painting

Hungarian School

• Wagner, Alexander von - 1 painting

See also

• Grade I listed buildings in Greater Manchester
• Grade II* listed buildings in Greater Manchester

References

1. ^ ^{a b} City Art Gallery, Images of England, http://www.imagesofengland.org.uk/Details/Default.aspx?id=388331, retrieved 2007-12-14 

External links

• Manchester City Galleries Official Site

Coordinates: 53°28′43″N 2°14′29″W / 53.47861°N 2.24139°W / 53.47861; -2.24139