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The Art Galleries
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The Picture collection Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery houses one of the largest collections in existence of British paintings of all periods, including the world famous collection of Pre-Raphaelite paintings. The 17th, 18th and 19th centuries are those most fully represented in the permanent collections. Foreign pictures are fewer in number, but are of high quality. |
Students can study the principal movements in the history of the Fine and Applied Arts in Europe through the major works in the collection, which represent the range of developments from the 14th to the 20th centuries. These include substantial groups of 17th, 18th, and 19th century foreign paintings.
The Sculpture collection
This includes good holdings of British early 20th century sculpture, with a few fine examples of earlier work. There are good examples of baroque sculpture, and an outstanding collection of Victorian and Edwardian sculpture. This includes one of the finest collections of the work of Sir Alfred Cilbert. The 20th century sculpture collection, which is gradually being strengthened, is especially rich in the work of Sir Jacob Epstein.
The Prints and Drawings collection
The Birmingham collection of prints, drawings and watercolours is one of the largest in the country, representing most major British artists of the 18th and 19th century. The collection has great breadth, as well as strength in individual artists such as Sandby, Towne, Cozens, Cox, Lewis and Ruskin.
Less familiar are the holdings of 20th century works on paper.
In the last ten years the Art Gallery has been steadily adding to its collection of modern prints. It now possesses a representative selection of works by British, and to a lesser extent, European and American artist printmakers, made in the last fifty years.
The Applied Art collection
Encompasses ceramics, glass and stained glass, textiles and costume, furniture, metalwork, jewellery and contemporary crafts.
The Alan Green collection of William de Morgan's ceramics is particularly noteworthy. The Oriental Gallery (10) features different aspects of Birmingham's diverse collections.