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Why London has this collection
A government purchase of 38 paintings in 1824 began a public collection that grew through buying, gifts and bequests.
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A house before a gallery
In 1824, Parliament bought 38 paintings from the collection of the financier John Julius Angerstein. The pictures cost £57,000 and first opened to the public on 10 May in his former home at 100 Pall Mall. Visitors encountered a national collection in rooms that had been a private house. Sir George Beaumont’s promised gift, received in 1826, soon added another important group.
The money behind the pictures
Angerstein’s wealth came partly from marine insurance linked to the slave economy. He also acted as a trustee for estates and enslaved people in Grenada and Antigua. The extent of the insurance income connected to slavery is not known, and there is no evidence that he himself traded in or owned enslaved people. Those distinctions are necessary for understanding his role without turning different forms of involvement into the same claim.
A public home in the city
The collection moved to William Wilkins’s new building on Trafalgar Square in 1838. A central location helped make it available to a wider public and to artists who could study earlier painting. Buying and receiving pictures over generations changed its range. The museum you visit today is the result of those decisions, alongside the work of caring for, researching and displaying the collection.
Look at one arrival
When a painting catches your attention, its route to the Gallery can open another story. Its maker, original patron, later owners and date of acquisition describe different stages of its life. The Gallery’s wartime history and the changes to its building add further chapters. You do not have to learn them all before looking, but they explain why paintings made for distant homes and churches now share these rooms.
Photo gallery 1
Image credits
- xiquinhosilva · Central Hall, National Gallery.jpg · CC BY 2.0 · WebP / AVIF
- https://www.flickr.com/photos/bryansjs · Entrance hall of the National Gallery, looking north.jpg · CC BY-SA 2.0 · WebP / AVIF
- https://www.flickr.com/photos/bryansjs · Entrance hall of the National Gallery, looking south.jpg · CC BY-SA 2.0 · WebP / AVIF
- Diego Delso · Bóveda de la sala 36, Galería Nacional, Londres, Inglaterra, 2014-08-11, DD 165-167 HDR.JPG · CC BY-SA 4.0 · WebP / AVIF
- Philafrenzy · National Gallery Sainsbury Wing staircase.jpg · CC0 · WebP / AVIF