Victoria & Albert Museum
V&A Museum – upcoming events“Grace Kelly Style” — Fashion for a Hollywood Princess
17th Apr – 26th Sep 2010 “Grace Kelly Style” will feature over 50 outfits from Grace Kelly’s spectacular wardrobe. Dresses from her Hollywood films will also be shown, as well as the gown she wore to accept her Oscar award in 1955. These will be accompanied by film clips and posters, photographs and her Oscar statuette.
My Generation: The Glory Years of British Rock
30th Apr – 24th Oct 2010 “My Generation: The Glory Years of British Rock” will bring together 200 of Harry Goodwin’s most memorable rock photographs — everything from a shocked Bob Dylan blinded by his flashbulb, to Jimi Hendrix playing the guitar with his teeth.
Raphael’s Sistine Chapel Tapestries
8th Sep – 17th Oct 2010 This is your chance to see four of Raphael’s tapestries for the Sistine Chapel alongside their full-size designs — the Raphael Cartoons. Made almost 500 years ago, these are the only surviving tapestries designed by Raphael, and will coincide with the visit of Pope Benedict XVI.
The Victoria & Albert Museum – also known as the V&A – is London’s museum of art and design.
It was established in 1852 using profits from the Great Exhibition. It combined all the work from the old School of Design and Museum of Manufactures, and lumped it into the big Brompton Boilers building.
By the turn of the century the eclectic collection had grown so large and cumbersome that a better building was commissioned by Queen Victoria.
Medieval Treasury, and Cast Room
The highlight in the Medieval Treasury is the Becket Casket. This was created by the Limoges Enamellers in 1180 and depicts the death of Thomas Becket in Canterbury Cathedral. It comes complete with a scrap of blood-stained cloth – supposedly worn by Becket himself at the moment of death.
The Raphael Cartoons were commissioned by Pope Leo X in 1515, in preparation for the tapestries that hang upon the Sistine Chapel. They were purchased by the future Charles I in 1623.
The Cast Rooms are particularly impressive – two-stories high and filled with reproductions of every famous statue known to man. All of the casts are life-size and look identical to the originals.
Highlights include the Trajan’s Column in Rome, the Portico de la Gloria, from Santiago de Compostela, and Michelangelo’s David. Also on display is the world-famous Three Graces, by Antonio Canova.
Indian and Asian art
The Nehru Gallery of Indian Art has everything from fine Asian paintings and white jade cups, to 17th-century thumb rings from Shah Jehan (builder of the Taj Mahal). There is also the world-famous Tipoo Tiger – also known as the Tiger of Mysore. This life-size sculpture of a tiger eating a man comes complete with growls and screams from a hidden music box.
There is also a 9-foot porcelain model of a Chinese pagoda – only one of ten that have survived to the modern day.
All of the Indian art at the V&A comes from the old Indian Museum in Exhibition Road. This was demolished in 1956 and spread amongst the institutions.
Dress Collection, and British art
The Victoria and Albert Museum has a fine collection of British art from Gainsborough, Constable and J W Turner, to Landseer, Etty and Reynolds.
The Dress Collection traces the entire history of fashion from our distant forbears to modern-day flares. You can see Elizabethan ball-gowns and Victorian skirts, to flower-power hippy gear straight from the sixties. Clothes plucked from the catwalks in Milan stand side-by-side with royal robes from the 18th-century.
Fashion designers from the past and present all get a look-in – from post-war Dior, to Versace and Chanel.
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ivvey2010Facts and information
- Address:
- Victoria & Albert Museum, Cromwell Road, South Kensington,
London SW7 2RL
England - Telephone:
- Work +44 (0) 207 942 2000
- Buses:
- 14 70 74 345 360414 430 C1
- Trains:
- South Kensington CR DS PC
- Opening times:
- 10–5.45 (Mon–Thu, Sat–Sun); 10–10 (Fri)
- Cost:
- Free
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Victoria & Albert Museum
Gardens at the V&A, London
Decorations at the V&A Museum
The Hall of ReplicasExhibits in the Cast Room
Michelangelo’s ‘David’, at the V&A
Trajan’s Column, The Cast Room
Cast Room, Victoria & Albert Museum
The Portico de la Gloria