Museum reviews: The Tate Britain (Tate Gallery), London, UK
The Tate Britain, or the Tate, as it was known until the appearance of its modern counterpart in 2000, is a good all-rounder kind of gallery. Nearest tube station is Pimlico, or go to Vauxhall and make your way over the bridge to and walk east along thre river.
The building is rather grandeous, what you’d expect from a gallery really. Take note of the ice cream van parked out front of the main entrance. Remember, the gallery is FREE, so forget stopping for refreshments in the ridiculously expensive gallery cafe, pop outside for a break and get a 99 Flake instead (that’s Mr. Whippy vanilla ice cream in a cone with a cadbury’s flake in it, for you American folk).
If you can, try and leave a donation upon entrance, if not, scurry past, guiltily.
The galleries in the West wing tend to house the permanent collection, which is mainly European, 1400 – 1900: Rennaissance, Impressionist, Romantic and so on, Holbein, Degas, Turner, Constable, blah blah, you get the picture.
In the galleries on the East side of the main entrance exhibitions are housed. If you come towards the end of the year, around October/Novermber time, you can see what’s contending in the Turner Prize, but this will set you back around a tenner.
My enjoyment of the Tate goes only so far. The pieces on display here permanently should definitely be seen once, they are ‘important’ in the history of art, however they don’t move me enough to want to see them on a regular basis. I once saw a Tracy Emin exhibition there that really moved me, the curator responsible for that done good.
