The Victoria and Albert Museum (often written as V&A) in London is the world's largest and finest museum of decorative arts and design. It has a permanent collection of over 4.5 million objects.
The Victoria and Albert Museum was founded in 1852. At that time, it was known as the South Kensington Museum. Since then, it has expanded to cover some 12.5 acres and has 145 galleries, showcasing works of art from ancient times to the present day, in virtually every medium, across cultures, from European art to North American, to Asian and North African.
The museum is located at the district called Albertopolis, a place where institutions of cultural, scientific and educational importance congregate. Counted as neighbours to the Victoria and Albert Museum is the Natural History Museum and the Science Museum. As with other national UK museums, the Victoria and Albert Museum provides free admittance since 2001.
The V&A was born out of The Great Exhibition of 1851, in which the museum's first director, Henry Cole, was very much involved. The Great Exhibition was the brainchild of Prince Albert, and its great success resulted in a profit of £186,000, which was used to purchase the land in South Kensington, on which the Victoria & Albert Museum stands. It was originally known as The Museum of Manufactures, and opened in May 1852, at Marlborough House. It only stayed there for a few months before moving in September of the same year to Somerset House.
The museum's permanent location was identified in 1854. At that time, it was renamed South Kensington Musuem. The present building was designed by German architect Gottfried Semper in 1855, and opened by Queen Victoria on 22 June 1857. The following year, the invention of gas lighting made night opening possible. In those early years, the museum emphasized the practical aspects of its collection, as opposed the "High Art" of the National Gallery or the scholarship of the British Museum. Through this policy, the School of Art - precursor to the Royal College of Art - was transferred out. Between 1860 and 1880, the scientific collection was also filtered out, to form the Science Museum, founded in 1893.
Queen Victoria made her last official public appearance during the laying of the foundation stone of the Aston Webb building, in 17 May 1899, during which time, the museum changed its name from South Kensington Museum to Victoria and Albert Museum.
External Site
Official website of the Victoria and Albert Museum
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Victoria and Albert Museum
Author: admed morsy (GFDL)
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