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Museum Details
Christ Church Picture Gallery, Oxford
Christ Church
Oxford
OX1 1DP
Oxfordshire
England
Collection details
Decorative and Applied Art
Fine Art
Religion
Facilities
Shop: yes
Guided tours: yes
Study area: yes
Visual disability facilities: yes
Contact details
General information (Tel)
:
01865 276 172
General information (Fax)
:
01865 202 429
Curator
:
Jacqueline.thalmann@chch.ox.ac.uk
E-mail
:
picturegallery@chch.ox.ac.uk
Website
:
www.chch.ox.ac.uk/gallery/index.html
Open
1st April - 30th September:
Mon-Sat 10.30-5.00
Sun 2.00-5.00
1st October- 31st March:
Mon-Sat 10.30-1.00 and 2.00-4.30
Sun 2.00-4.30
Admission charges
Adults: £2.00
Concessions: £1.00
Discounts
Museums Association
Description
Christ Church is unique among the Oxford and Cambridge colleges in possessing an important collection of Old Master paintings and drawings, housed in a purpose-built Gallery of considerable architectural interest in itself.
General John Guise bequeathed his collection of over 200 paintings and almost 2000 drawings to his former college, where it arrived after his death in 1765. This extraordinary gift enabled Christ Church to introduce art into Oxford education without the necessity to travel to Italy or to gain access to stately homes, which still held the majority of art collections in the country. At that date the collection was unequalled by any other Oxford institution.
Bernardo Daddi
Four Musical Angels (about 1340)
(Egg tempera on wood - Fox-Strangways Gift, 1828)
The Bodleian ‘Picture Gallery’ housed mainly portraits and the Ashmolean Museum, the oldest museum in Britain, had a large and interesting collection of artifacts and objects, but at that time included few paintings.
The collection was reinforced by the subsequent gifts by the Hon. William Fox-Strangways (37 paintings, given in 1828 and 1834), including Filippino Lippi’s ‘The Wounded Centaur’, and by the family of the poet Walter Savage Landor (26 paintings, given in 1897).
A number of subsequent gifts and bequests of paintings enabled Christ Church’s art collection to grow, until today it consists of some 300 paintings and almost 2000 drawings. The last two major donations to the Picture Gallery enriched it further with a collection of English Glass of the 18th and 19th centuries and a number of Russian icons of the 17th and 18th century. These treasures are now displayed and cared for in Christ Church Picture Gallery. The purpose-built gallery conceived to house the collection was designed by the architects Powell and Moya and was opened in 1968 by Her Majesty the Queen. Previously the paintings had been mainly hung in the Library.
Collections description
The collection is strongest in Italian art, from the 14th to the 18th century. Most of the early Italian panel paintings came in the gift by Fox-Strangways and reflect his taste for 14th century Italian panel painting, a preference which was unusual at that time. A number of these early religious panels are painted by now anonymous masters, but they allow the viewer to trace the beginnings of the professional ‘artist’ as we know him. Later works in the collection include paintings by highly acclaimed artists such as Filippino Lippi, Tintoretto, Veronese, Annibale Carracci and Salvator Rosa. Additionally, there are also some remarkable works by northern painters such as Anthony van Dyck, Frans Hals and Hugo van der Goes.
The internationally renowned drawings collection in the Picture Gallery at Christ Church is regarded as one of the most important private collections of Old Master drawings in the country and includes work by many masters of the calibre of Leonardo, Michelangelo, Dürer, Raphael and Rubens. For reasons of conservation the entire drawings collection cannot be permanently on show, but a selection of drawings is always on view. These small in-house exhibitions are changed about every three months to enable the public to see a varied selection from this part of the collection.
Key artists and exhibits
Filippino Lippi
;
Tintoretto
;
Veronese
;
Annibale Carracci
;
Salvator Rosa
;
Anthony van Dyck
;
Frans Hals
;
Hugo van der Goes
;
Leonardo
;
Michelangelo
;
Dürer
;
Raphael
;
Rubens
Articles
Da Vinci Dissected As Universal Leonardo Initiative Launches Across Europe
Museums and Galleries in Berkshire, Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire
Trails
Leonardo In Oxford: A Da Vinci Trail Around The University Museums
Hidden Treasure Trail For Oxford
General Information
Brochure or leaflet available with directions to museum
Pre-booking service for groups
Guided tours
Collections
General guide to collections available
Specialist publications on collections available
Object study facilities available (enquire in advance)
Disability Access
Large print information and/or interpretation
General Education
Academic publications and resources available
Adult lectures and courses held
Loan service
Facilities
Facilities for private functions and events
Object study facilities available (enquire in advance)
Research facilities for academics
Shop
Study facilities
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