Museum acquisitions

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.

The Tate has acquired a major portrait by Sir Joshua Reynolds (1723-1792) from Castle Howard in North Yorkshire after it was accepted in lieu of inheritance tax.

An impressive and richly decorated pair of early 17th century gilt bronze and pietre dura inlaid Italian cabinets, which stood in Castle Howard, Yorkshire for two and a half centuries, have been saved for the Nation by the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge.

The V&A have acquired an early form by the artist-potter Hans Coper (1920-81). Made in 1955 in the studio Coper shared with Lucie Rie in Paddington, London, the large bowl was the subject of a temporary export ban in 2015 in the hope a UK buyer could be found.

Without computers, virtual reality was a very different concept 200 years ago. Clever use of optics and illusion was the key, as a paper peepshow collection given to London’s Victoria and Albert Museums demonstrates beautifully.

The Bowes Museum has secured funding at a sum of nearly £2.3m to keep an exit-barred painting attributed to the workshop of Dieric Bouts the Elder in the UK.

Sim Fine Art have sold their first ever painting to the Tate who have added it to their permanent collection.

More than 25,160 visitors attended the 44th annual Art & Antiques Fair, Olympia which concluded its seven day run yesterday.

Two finely carved marble figures of mourners from the tomb of Jean de France, the duc de Berry (1340-1416) brother of King Charles V of France were secured by the Louvre for €4.4m (£3.67m) at Christie’s Paris last week.