The Royal Collection is the art collection of the British Royal Family. It is technically not the private property of the monarch, being held in trust for her successors and the nation. It contains over 7,000 paintings, 40,000 watercolours and drawings, and about 150,000 old master prints, as well as tapestries, furniture, ceramics, books, and other works of art. It is physically dispersed between a number of locations some, like Hampton Court Palace open to the public and not lived in by the Royal Family, whilst others like Windsor Castle are both residences and open to the public. The Queen's Gallery at Buckingham Palace in London exists to show displays and exhibitions from the collection for several months at a time. There is also a Queen's Gallery next to the Palace of Holyroodhouse in Edinburgh.

History

Few items survive from before King Henry VIII. The most important additions to the collection were made by Charles I, a passionate collector of Italian paintings, and a major patron of Van Dyck and other artists. His collection was sold after his execution in 1649, but large numbers of works were recovered for the collection after the Restoration of 1660. George III added very large numbers, especially of prints and drawings, and Queen Victoria and her husband Albert were keen collectors of contemporary and old master paintings. Many works have been given from the collection to museums, especially by George III and Victoria and Albert.

Collection Highlights

Paintings, Prints and Drawings

Anglo-American

*West, Benjamin - 60 paintings;

Dutch School (200+ works) ^[1]

*Cuyp, Aelbert - 7 paintings;

*Borch, Gerard ter - 2 paintings;

*Dou, Gerrit - 4 paintings;

*Hals, Frans - 1 paintings;

*Hobbema, Meyndert - 2 paintings;

*Hooch, Pieter de - 3 paintings;

*Metsu, Gabriel - 1 painting;

*Mytens, Daniel - 2 paintings;

*Ostade, Adriaen van - 5 paintings;

*Rembrandt van Rijn - 6 paintings;

*Ruysdael, Salomon van - 1 painting;

*Ruisdael, Jacob van - 1 painting;

*Steen, Jan - 7 paintings;

*Vermeer, Johannes - 1 painting;

*Velde, Adriaen van de - 4 paintings;

*Velde, Willem van de...the Younger - 7 paintings;

*Weenix, Jan - 1 painting;

*Wouwerman, Philip - 5 paintings;

Flemish School

*Bruegel, Jan - 1 painting;

*Bruegel, Pieter - 1 painting;

*Frans Francken the Younger - 1 painting;

*Marcus Gheeraerts the Younger - 1 painting;

*Gossaert, Jan - 1 painting;

*Massys, Quentin - 1 painting;

*Memling, Hans - 1 painting'

*Rubens, Peter Paul - 13 paintings, 5 drawings;

*Teniers, David - 5 paintings;

*Van Dyck, Anthony - 26 paintings;

English School

*Beechey, William - 17 paintings;

*Gainsborough, Thomas - 30 paintings, also a rare mythological work Diana and Actaeon;

*Hogarth, William - 3 paintings;

*Hoppner, John - 7 paintings;

*Kneller, Sir Godfrey - 15 paintings;

*Landseer, Sir Edwin - 100 paintings and drawings;

*Lawrence, Thomas - 50 paintings;

*Lely, Peter - 20 paintings;

*Reynolds, Joshua - 20 paintings;

*Stubbs, George - 18 paintings;

French School

*Clouet, François - 3 paintings;

*Dughet, Gaspard - 3 paintings;

*Gellée, Claude - 5 paintings;

*Liotard, Jean-Étienne - 16 paintings;

*Monet, Claude - 1 painting;

*Poussin, Nicolas - A large collection of his drawings at Windsor, second only to that in the Musée du Louvre;

*Tour, Georges de la - 1 painting;

Italian School

*Allori, Alessandro - 1 painting;

*Angelico, Fra - 1 painting;

*Bassano, Jacopo - 4 paintings;

*Bellini, Giovanni - 1 painting;

*Bernini, Gianlorenzo - 50 drawings;

*Borromini, Francesco - 100 drawings;

*Bronzino, Agnolo - 1 painting;

*Canaletto, (Giovanni Antonio Canal) - Over 50 paintings and 140 drawings, the greatest collection in the world;

*Carlevaris, Luca - 4 paintings;

*Caravaggio, Michelangelo Merisi da - 2 paintings;

*Carracci, Agostino, Annibale and Ludovico - 5 paintings, more than 350 drawings;

*Caravaggio, Polidoro da - 9 paintings;

*Castiglione, Giovanni Benedetto - 260 drawings;

*Correggio, Antonio Allegri - 2 paintings;

*Daddi, Bernardo - 1 painting;

*Domenichino, Zapieri - 1 painting, 1,700 Domenichinos in thirty-four albums, the Royal Collection’s largest holdings by a single artist;

*Duccio di Buoninsegna - 1 painting;

*Gentile da Fabriano - 1 painting;

*Fetti, Domenico - 3 paintings;

*Guercino, (Giovanni Francesco Barbieri) - 1 painting, and largest group of Guercino drawings in the world, some 400 sheets, as well as 200 by his assistants and 200 other works;

*Giordano, Luca - 12 paintings;

*Leonardo da Vinci - 600 drawings, finest collection of Da Vinci drawings in the world; ^[2]

*Longhi, Pietro - 2 paintings;

*Lotto, Lorenzo - 1 painting;

*Mantegna, Andrea - 9 canvases known as The Triumphs of Caesar

*Michelangelo Buonarroti - 20 drawings;

*Parmigianino - 2 paintings and 30 drawings

*Pesellino, Francesco - 1 painting;

*Raphael, (Raffaello Sanzio) - 8 Paintings, as well as an extensive collection of drawings. There are seven full-size cartoons for the tapestries designed to hang in the Sistine Chapel. During the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, Raphael attained the zenith of his reputation. Consequently, the Raphael Cartoons have became some of the most famous, and widely imitated, paintings in the world. Since 1865 they have been on loan from the Royal Collection to the V&A.;

*Raffaellino del Garbo - 1 painting;

*Reni, Guido - 1 painting;

*Ricci, Sebastiano - 6 paintings;

*Romano, Giulio - 6 paintings;

*Sacchi, Andrea - 130 drawings;

*Sarto, Andrea del - 2 paintings

*Strozzi, Zanobi - 1 painting;

*Tintoretto, Jacopo - 5 paintings;

*Titian, (Tiziano Vecelli) - 4 paintings;^[3]

*Vaga, Perino del - 2 paintings;

*Vasari, Giorgio - 1 painting;

*Veronese, Paolo - 3 paintings;

*Verrio, Antonio - 1 painting;

*Zuccarelli, Francesco - 27 paintings, together with 8 works collaborated with Antonio Visentini;

German School

*Dürer, Albrecht - 1 painting;

*Holbein, Hans - 7 paintings, 80 drawings and 5 miniatures;

*Lucas Cranach the Elder - 4 paintings;

*Winterhalter, Franz Xaver - 120 paintings, 20 drawings & watercolours;

*Zoffany, Johan - 17 paintings;

•  • [ e] Museums with major collections of Paintings (mid-13th century to 20C)

Muse du Louvre, Paris, France : 11,900 paintings [4] Museo del Prado, Madrid, Spain : 8,600 paintings http://museoprado.mcu.es/ihistoria.html State Hermitage, St. Petersburg, Russia : 7,869 paintings http://www.hermitagefriends.org/state_herm_Mus.aspx Royal Collection, London, UK : 7,000 paintings http://www.royalcollection.org.uk/default.asp?action=article&ID=16 Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, Netherlands : 5,500 painting http://www.rijksmuseum.nl/collectie/schilderijenpresentatie?lang=en Musee d'Orsay, Paris, France : 5,033 paintings http://www.musee-orsay.fr/en/collections/index-of-works/resultat-collection.html?no_cache=1&S=O Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence, Italy : 4,800 paintings http://www.mega.it/eng/egui/monu/ufu.htm Tate Collection, London, UK : 4,442 paintings http://www.tate.org.uk/servlet/WorksList?searchid=13080&page=1 Neue Pinakothek, Munich, Germany : 4,000 paintings http://www.pinakothek.de/neue-pinakothek/sammlung/rundgang/rundgang_en.php Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten Antwerpen, Antwerp, Belgium : 3,200 paintings http://www.wga.hu/frames-e.html?/bio/k/kobell/biograph.html Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest, Hungary : 3,000 paintings http://www2.szepmuveszeti.hu/gyujt_eng.htm Das Stdel Museum, Frankfurt, Germany : 2,700 paintings http://www.staedelmuseum.de/ National Gallery, London, UK : 2,300 paintings http://www.nationalgallery.org.uk Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, USA : 2,200 paintings http://www.metmuseum.org/Works_of_Art/introduction.asp?dep=11 Victoria & Albert Museum, London, UK : 2,000 paintings http://www.vam.ac.uk/collections/paintings/index.html Yale Center for British Art, Connecticut, USA : 1,900 paintings http://ycba.yale.edu/collections/coll_p-s-index.html Accademia Carrara di Bergamo, Bergamo, Italy : 1,800 paintings http://www3.oag.com/Cities/Detail?city=28&item=145554&cat=26 Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, UK 1697 paintings (inc. 200 paintings from Christ Church Picture Gallery) [1] [2] Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, USA 1,600 paintings [3] Grflich Lambergsche Gemhlde-Gallerie, Akademie der bildenden Knste Wien, Vienna, Austria 1,600 paintings [4] Liechtenstein Museum, Vienna, Austria 1,500 paintings [5] Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna, Austria 1,400 paintings [6] National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., USA 1,200 paintings [7] Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, UK 1,181 paintings [8] Fogg Art Museum, Massachusetts, USA 1,100 paintings [9] Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, USA 1,011 paintings [10] Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, Spain 1,000 paintings [11] Munch Museum, Oslo, Norway 1,000 paintings [12] Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art, Connecticut, USA 900 paintings [13] Minneapolis Institute of Arts, Minneapolis, USA 900 paintings [14] Le Muse Cond, Chantilly, France 850 paintings [15] Alte Pinakothek, Munich, Germany 800 paintings [16] Mauritshuis, The Hague, Netherlands 800 paintings [17] Doria Pamphilj Gallery, Rome, Italy 800 paintings [18] Barnes Foundation, Philadelphia, USA 800 paintings [19] Gemldegalerie Alte Meister, Dresden, Germany 750 paintings [20] Wallace Collection, London, UK 650 paintings [21] Dulwich Picture Gallery, London, UK 644 paintings [22] Courtauld Institute of Art, London, UK 530 paintings [23] Palazzo Pitti, Florence, Italy 500 paintings [24] Vatican Museums, Vatican City 460 Paintings (ex. Raphael Stanze, Sistine Chapel) [25] J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, USA 450 paintings [26] Muse National Picass, Paris, France 250 paintings (small selection of work by other artists) [27] Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam, Netherlands 200 paintings [28] Notable Exceptions (lack of information): Museum of Modern Art, New York, USA The Phillips Collection, Washington, USA Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, USA Muse de l'Orangerie, Paris, France Muse Jacquemart-Andr, Paris, France Muse Marmottan-Monet, Paris, France Muse Marmottan-Monet, Paris, France Schloss Wilhelmshhe, Kassel, Germany Galleria Borghese, Rome, Italy Palazzo Spada, Rome, Italy n.b. it should be noted that this list is controversial, in so far as it contains only qualitative analysis of museum holdings. These may or may not reflect actual artistic quality of collections in question.

Furniture

*André-Charles Boulle - Several examples

*Jean Henri Riesener - Roll-Top Desk

*Adam Weisweiler - Pietra Dura commode as well as other pieces

Decorative Arts

*Fabergé - One of the best collections in the world;

*Sèvres Porcelain - probably the best collection in the world;

*Chelsea porcelain - complete service completed 1763

*Gobelins Tapestry - Sets of: Don Quixote, Jason and the Golden Fleece & Les Amours des Dieux

Sculpture

*Canova - 3 works: Mars and Venus, Dirce & Fountain Nymph

*John Gibson - Queen Victoria

*Ancient Roman - Crouching Venus

Management

The Royal Collection Department is part of the Royal Household, responsible for the cataloguing, conservation, cleaning, restoration and display of the books, pictures, sculptures and other works of art collected by the British Royal Family. Buildings do not come under its remit.

Gallery

'Paintings'

ALLORI - Judith with the Head of Holofernes (1613)	ANGELICO, FRA - Blessing Redeemer (1423)
BELLINI - Portrait of a young man (1505-09)	CARAVAGGIO - The Calling of Saints Peter and Andrew (1571-1610)
CLAUDE - A view of the Roman Campagna from Tivoli, evening (1644-5	CORREGGIO - The Holy Family with Saint Jerome (1517-19)
DADDI - The Marriage of the Virgin (1330-42)	DUCCIO - Triptych (1305-8)
DÃœRER - Portrait of Burkard von Speyer (1506)	HOLBEIN - 'Noli me tangere' (1524)
LOTTO - Andrea Odoni (1527)	MANTEGNA - The Triumphs of Caesar, IX - Julius Caesar on his triumphal chariot (1484-92)
RAPHAEL - St Paul Preaching in Athens (1515)	REMBRANDT - Agatha Bas (1641)
RENI - Cleopatra with the Asp (1630)	REYNOLDS - The Death of Dido (1781)
RICCI - The Adoration of the Magi (1726-30)	RUBENS - Pythagoras advocating vegetarianism (1618-20)
TENIERS - The Virgin and Child with Saints Stephen, Jerome and Maurice (1656)	TINTORETTO - Esther before Ahasuerus (1547-48)
TITIAN - Portrait of a Man ('Jacopo Sannazaro') (1511-12)	VAN DYCK - Cupid and Psyche (1639-40)
VERONESE - The Marriage of Saint Catherine (1580)	ZOFFANY - The Tribuna of the Uffizi (1772-78)

References

External links

• Offical Site

•  • [ e] Museums and galleries in London

Apsley House Barbican Art Gallery British Museum Burgh House Churchill Museum and Cabinet War Rooms Percival David Foundation Design Museum Dulwich Picture Gallery Estorick Collection Foundling Museum Freud Museum Geffrye Museum Guildhall Art Gallery Handel House Museum Hayward Gallery HMS Belfast Hogarth's House Horniman Museum Imperial War Museum Institute of Contemporary Arts London Transport Museum Museum in Docklands Museum of London National Gallery National Maritime Museum National Portrait Gallery Natural History Museum Petrie Museum Queen's Gallery Royal Academy of Arts Royal Collection Saatchi Gallery Science Museum Serpentine Gallery Sir John Soane's Museum Somerset House – Courtauld Gallery, Gilbert Collection, Hermitage Rooms Sutton House Tate Britain Tate Modern Victoria and Albert Museum V&A Museum of Childhood Wallace Collection Whitechapel Art Gallery