GLASGOW MUSEUMS

Glasgow Museums

Glasgow Style gallery, Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum, with Margaret Macdonald Mackintosh's The May Queen 1890 gesso panels. © CSG CIC Glasgow Museums Collection.

Keywords

Scottish; Painting; Sculpture; Design; Pre-Raphaelite; Celtic Revival;
Symbolist; Glasgow School; Arts and Crafts; Expressionist; Modern, Abstract; Contemporary

Institution Profile

Glasgow Museums is part of Glasgow Life, a registered charity and ALEO of Glasgow City Council. It has delegated
responsibility for managing the city’s museums and collections, including making new acquisitions, developing exhibitions, collection research and public programming. Its purpose is to inspire and enrich the lives of Glasgow’s citizens
and visitors.

There are ten museum venues across the city: Kelvingrove Art
Gallery and Museum, Gallery of Modern Art, The Burrell Collection, People’s Palace, Riverside Museum, St Mungo Museum of Religious Life and Art, Provand’s Lordship, Scotland Street School, Glasgow Museums Resource Centre
and Kelvin Hall. Admission is free for everyone.

Collection Interests

Glasgow Museums’ world class collection was built on substantial gifts from wealthy local industrialists. The first was a bequest in 1854 from coachbuilder Archibald McLellan (1795–1854), including three flowerpieces by Dutch
Baroque painter Rachel Ruysch and a fancy picture by French artist Caroline de Valory. Subsequent gifts came from insurance broker William Euing (1788–1874), wealthy heiress Jane Graham-Gilbert (1801–1877), shipbuilder Isabella Elder (1828–1905), chemical manufacturer William Chrystal
(1854–1921) and engineer Sir John Richmond (1869–1963); the artworks they donated were almost exclusively by male artists.

However, the works of women artists were collected and gifted during the 20th century and in the 21st century Glasgow Museums is actively addressing the gender imbalance with focused new acquisitions, research and displays. Scottish women artists currently represented include: sculptors Phyllis Bone and Mary Buchanan; Glasgow School artists Stansmore Dean, Norah Neilson Gray, Jessie M.
King, Bessie MacNicol, Frances Macdonald and Margaret Macdonald Mackintosh; Edinburgh artist and designer Phoebe Traquair; 20th century artists Mary Armour, Wilhelmina Barns-Graham, Isabel Brodie Babianska, Dorothy Carleton Smyth, Jean Fleming, Joan Eardley, Florence Jamieson, Margaret Morris, Anne Redpath and Margot Sandeman; and contemporary artists Sara Barker, Christine
Borland, Rabiya Choudhry, Jacqueline Donachie, Victoria Morton, Carol Rhodes, Camara Taylor and Alberta Whittle. There is much scope for new research, particularly on lesser known women who studied, worked, exhibited and joined
art societies in Glasgow, suffragists/suffragettes, LGBT women and female artists of colour.