Museum acquisitions

A 3000-year old torc found in a field in east Cambridgeshire is one of the largest and heaviest to be unearthed in the UK.

The Rosalinde and Arthur Gilbert Galleries in the Victoria & Albert Museum has re-opened with more than 500 objects on display, free to the public.

The Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge hopes to raise the final £65,000 needed to buy a 17th century gilded mirror frame for its collection.

The National Gallery has received one of the paintings from the collection of the late art critic Brian Sewell.

Edwin Landseer’s Monarch of the Glen has been withdrawn from auction at Christie’s following an agreement between the consignor and the National Galleries of Scotland to help the museum retain the iconic painting.

The Yorkshire Museum has acquired the Wold Newton Hoard after receiving funds totalling £44,200.

The Library and Museum of Freemasonry in London has revealed the latest addition to its collection.

The Ashmolean Museum has made a significant stride towards the retention of a Viking hoard with the receipt of a grant of more than £1.1m from the Heritage Lottery Fund.

The National Portrait Gallery today launched an appeal to finish raising the £1.3m necessary to secure Thomas Lawrence’s portrait of Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington for its collection.

A 600-work collection of late 19th and early 20th century French paintings worth an estimated €350m has been pledged to the Musee d’Orsay.

Richard Green has sold the Old Master oil painting "A Woman Feeding a Parrot" by Caspar Netscher to the National Gallery of Art in Washington DC.

An Old Master painting recently saved for the nation by the Bowes Museum is set to be showcased at a new exhibition held in the painting’s new home.

In a new weekend series, Antiques Trade Gazette brings you a selection of quotes from dealers, auctioneers, collectors and others – from the future gazing to recalling past mistakes. For instance, which world famous art dealer sold a signed John Lennon album for a song?

For the second time in a month a French museum has secured a painting by Hubert Robert.

The Château of Versailles exercised its right of pre-emption to acquire an 18th century painting of its orangerie that was offered at auction.

The Tate has acquired its earliest picture by a female artist.

Islington Museum has paid £8000 for a screen collage by Joe Orton's lover and killer Kenneth Halliwell at a JP Humbert auction this week.

The director of the Victoria & Albert Museum is to step down this autumn after five years in the role.

With his trademark fez and deceptively shambolic stage persona, Tommy Cooper was one of Britain’s best known TV personalities. Now the Victoria & Albert Museum is acknowledging his fame and popularity with the announcement that they have acquired the comedian’s memorabilia collection.

The National Trust has acquired an important Jacobean portrait miniature for £2.1m from a private seller in a sale brokered by Omnia Art.