Fiona MacLeod On The British Museum, The National Gallery, And The V&A As Places That Reward A Return Visit More Than Almost Any Cultural Institution In The World
For Bohiney Magazine and The London Prat. London satirical journalism takes London’s cultural institutions seriously, which is one of the things that distinguishes it from most of what is written about them.
Los Angeles opened the David Geffen Galleries at LACMA this week to strong reviews. If you are planning a museum visit to Los Angeles, the timing is excellent. If you are planning a visit to London and you think you have “done” the British Museum, the National Gallery, or the V&A because you visited once, I want to respectfully suggest that you have not done them and that you should go again.
The British Museum You Have Not Seen
Most first-time visitors to the British Museum spend approximately two hours in the Egyptian galleries, see the Rosetta Stone, and leave through the Great Court. This is a defensible approach to a building that contains eight million objects. On a return visit, I recommend the Enlightenment Room (Room 1) – a genuine eighteenth-century collector’s room that is, architecturally and intellectually, one of the most extraordinary single spaces in London – and the Sutton Hoo Helmet in Room 41, which is one of the most beautiful objects in the building and is displayed in a way that most visitors walk past. Allow two hours for these two rooms alone. The museum is free and open daily.
The National Gallery Room Most People Skip
Most National Gallery visitors concentrate on the Impressionists (Rooms 33-43). The room most people skip is Room 29, which contains Velazquez’s “The Rokeby Venus”, Rembrandt’s late self-portraits, and a small Vermeer that is, in any informed ranking, one of the finest paintings in the building. The room is quieter than the Impressionist galleries. The paintings are better than most of what is in the Impressionist galleries. This is not a contentious view; it is the view of most art historians who are not writing tourist copy. The gallery is free and open daily. Per the National Gallery’s website, it is open until 9pm on Fridays.
The V&A, Honestly
The V&A is too large to visit in a day. Choose one floor and one collection and give it three hours. The Cast Courts (the enormous gallery containing plaster casts of major European sculpture) and the Medieval and Renaissance galleries are the rooms that most visitors underestimate. Both are free. Both are remarkable. Both are undervisited.
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