InfoBritain

 

Tate Britain, London

The Tate Britain is the national gallery of British art, displaying art linked to the history of Britain over the last five hundred years. Displays are roughly chronological. Rooms 1 - 17 display works before 1900, rooms 18 - 34 show works after that date. The rooms in the Clore gallery are dedicated to Turner. Displays are built around a particular theme, which is explained on a wall panel in each room. Pictures on show are changed regularly.

Wandering round the gallery there is a real sense of the change in the way people have looked at the world. Paintings don't seem so much a window on the world as a window into people's minds. It is remarkable how life is seen through the filter of conventions. When I visited, the Tudor and Stuart periods were represented by portraiture. The portrait of Queen Elizabeth, as the little note beside it explained, was not so much a likeness as a symbolic representation of the monarch. I found myself thinking about pictures of today's royals in the newspapers. Today of course we have photography, and it might seem as though we have now thrown off the old conventions and are looking at the people as they really are. This of course isn't true. People are still symbolically represented, in the choice of which pictures are used to support the story that requires writing.

I then moved on to the eighteenth century, passing pictures of Italy, glorified and frequently lovely holiday snaps for young men on their Grand Tour. There was a change here to an interest in the outdoors and in nature, something which is not seen in the Tudor and Stuart paintings. In the nineteenth century room nature became an overriding theme, in just the same way that it became a central theme for society in general. People living in the new urban life during the Industrial Revolution idealised countryside and rural life of the past. Paintings did the same. Gainsborough had various poor but happy people wiling away their days in lovely green surroundings. In reality people in the countryside were enduring conditions that were even harsher than those endured by people in the towns. John Constable liked painting Hampstead Heath, that area of nature which was easily accessible to Londoners wanting to take a walk.

Walking through the galleries of the Tate is like walking through history, seeing not so much the past world, as the way in which people saw it. The biographer of Richard the Third Michael Hicks has written: "In history what happened is often much less important than what is thought to have happened." The paintings I saw at the Tate gave a wonderful insight into the history of what people thought had happened.

Opening Times: 10am - 5.50pm daily, last admission is 5pm. Closed 24th - 26th December.

Directions: The Tate Britain is in Millbank, London. From the Houses of Parliament walk west along the Thames. The Tate is just beyond the Millbank tower. The nearest Underground stations are Pimlico, Westminster and Vauxhall. There is no dedicated car parking. Click here for an interactive map centred on the Tate Britain.

Access: Disabled parking spaces and wheelchairs are available on request. Ring 020 7887 8888 to reserve a space. There is full disabled access within the gallery. Audio, large print, tactile Braille guides, and raised thermoform versions of pictures on display are available. Sign interpreted talks are provided.

Contact:

telephone: tickets: 020 7887 8888

switchboard: 020 7887 8888

web site: http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/