National Gallery

The National Gallery was founded in 1824 when the British government purchased 38 paintings from the banker John Julius Angerstein's collection, and moved to its current purpose-built home on Trafalgar Square, designed by William Wilkins, in 1838. The neoclassical building has been expanded several times, most notably with the Sainsbury Wing, designed by Robert Venturi and completed in 1991 to house the museum's early Renaissance collection. The gallery holds over 2,300 paintings dated from the mid-13th to the early 20th century, including Jan van Eyck's Arnolfini Portrait, Caravaggio's Supper at Emmaus, Vermeer's A Young Woman Standing at a Virginal, and a substantial holding of Turner, Constable, and Van Gogh's Sunflowers. Unlike many national collections built through royal patronage, the National Gallery's collection developed through a mix of purchases, bequests, and public subscription, giving it comparatively even coverage across period and national school rather than concentration in any one country's art. Galleries are arranged broadly chronologically, from the Sainsbury Wing's 1250-1500 rooms through to the East Wing's 19th-century collection, allowing visitors to trace the development of Western painting in one route. The gallery underwent a major renovation completed in 2023, the 'National Gallery 200' project marking its bicentenary, which reworked the Sainsbury Wing entrance and public spaces. Admission to the permanent collection has remained free since the gallery's founding, a policy central to its founding mission of public access to art.