Victoria and Albert Museum
The Victoria and Albert Museum, also known as the National Museum of Art and Design, or simply as V&A, is the largest museum of decorative arts and design in the world. It is located on Exhibition Road in The Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea in London, next to the National History Museum and the Science Museum. It was built in honour of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert of England and was inaugurated in 1852.
The Victorian building occupies an area of over 5 hectares and contains 145 galleries displaying more than 4 million exhibits spanning 5,000 years of art history, from ancient times to the present day. The collections of the museum include, among others, the Raphael Cartoons - tapestries painted by the Renaissance painter Raphael for the Sistine Chapel, depicting scenes from the Gospels and Acts of the Apostles, as well as works by Botticelli, Tintoretto, Adriaen Brouwer, Jean-Baptiste Camille Corot, Gustave Courbet, Eugène Delacroix, Théodore Rousseau, Edgar Degas, Jean-François Millet, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Edward Burne-Jones donated in 1901 by the Victorian benefactor Constantine Alexander Ionides.
Apart from the collections of paintings and prints, the museum also displays collections of ceramics, glass, tapestries, furniture and decoration from different cultures: the European, Indian, Chinese, Japanese, and many others.
The Victoria and Albert Museum is located in what is popularly referred to as London's "Albertopolis", an area containing numerous educational, scientific and cultural sites.
Similar places by:
Architect |
Aston Webb |
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Category |
building architecture museum |
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Material |
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stone |
Neighbourhood | Kensington and Chelsea (LONDON) |
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Price | |
Geographical coordinates | 51.4958409, -0.1723169 |
Address | SW7 2 City of London, Cromwell Gardens |
Opening date | 1852 |
More information | official website |