An art gallery is a room or a building in which visual art is displayed. In Western cultures from the mid-15th century, a gallery was any long, narrow covered passage along a wall, first used in the sense of a place for art in the 1590s. The long gallery in Elizabethan and Jacobean houses served many purposes including the display of art. Historically, art is displayed as evidence of status and wealth, and for religious art as objects of ritual or the depiction of narratives. The first galleries were in the palaces of the aristocracy, or in churches. As art collections grew, buildings became dedicated to art, becoming the first art museums.
29-624: The Worcester City Art Gallery & Museum is an art gallery and local museum in Worcester , the county town of Worcestershire , England . The museum was founded in 1833 by members of the Worcestershire Natural History Society. It was originally located on Angel Street, but moved to larger premises on Foregate Street in 1836. Since 1896 it has been located in the Victoria Institute, which
58-429: A gallery, a kunsthalle is a facility that hosts temporary art exhibitions however does not possess a permanent collection . The art world comprises everyone involved in the production and distribution of fine art. The market for fine art depends upon maintaining its distinction as high culture , although during recent decades the boundary between high and popular culture has been eroded by postmodernism . In
87-649: A number of locations. Galleries selling the work of recognized artists may occupy space in established commercial areas of a city. New styles in art have historically been attracted to the low rent of marginal neighborhoods. An artist colony existed in Greenwich Village as early as 1850, and the tenements built around Washington Square Park to house immigrants after the Civil War also attracted young artists and avant-garde art galleries. The resulting gentrification prompted artists and galleries to move to
116-454: A painting by such an artist. An " old master print " is an original print (for example an engraving , woodcut , or etching ) made by an artist in the same period. The term "old master drawing " is used in the same way. In theory, "Old Master" applies only to artists who were fully trained, were Masters of their local artists' guild , and worked independently, but in practice, paintings produced by pupils or workshops are often included in
145-670: A usage datable to 1824. There are comparable terms in Dutch, French, and German; the Dutch may have been the first to make use of such a term, in the 18th century, when oude meester mostly meant painters of the Dutch Golden Age of the previous century. Les Maitres d'autrefois of 1876 by Eugene Fromentin may have helped to popularize the concept, although "vieux maitres" is also used in French. The famous collection in Dresden at
174-657: Is a unique commodity, the artist has a monopoly on production, which ceases when the artist either dies or stops working. Some businesses operate as vanity galleries , charging artists a fee to exhibit their work. Lacking a selection process to assure the quality of the artworks, and having little incentive to promote sales, vanity galleries are avoided as unprofessional. Some non-profit organizations or local governments host art galleries for cultural enrichment and to support local artists. Non-profit organizations may start as exhibit spaces for artist collectives , and expand into full-fledged arts programs. Other non-profits include
203-504: Is not. Edward Lucie-Smith gives an end date of 1800, noting "formerly used of paintings earlier than 1700". The term tends to be avoided by art historians as too vague, especially when discussing paintings, although the terms "Old Master Prints" and "Old Master drawings" are still used. It remains current in the art trade. Auction houses still usually divide their sales between, for example, "Old Master Paintings", "Nineteenth-century paintings", and "Modern paintings". Christie's defined
232-563: Is that while maintaining their urban establishments, galleries also participate in art fairs such as Art Basel and Frieze Art Fair . Art galleries are the primary connection between artists and collectors . At the high end of the market, a handful of elite auction houses and dealers sell the work of celebrity artists; at the low end artists sell their work from their studio, or in informal venues such as restaurants. Point-of-sale galleries connect artists with buyers by hosting exhibitions and openings. The artworks are on consignment, with
261-510: Is used to refer to establishments with distinct social and economic functions, both public and private. Institutions that preserve a permanent collection may be called either "gallery of art" or "museum of art". If the latter, the rooms where art is displayed within the museum building are called galleries. Art galleries that do not maintain a collection are either commercial enterprises for the sale of artworks, or similar spaces operated by art cooperatives or non-profit organizations . As part of
290-712: The Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister is one of the few museums to include the term in its actual name, although many more use it in the title of departments or sections. The collection in the Dresden museum essentially stops at the Baroque period. The end date is necessarily vague – for example, Goya (1746–1828) is certainly an Old Master, though he was still painting and printmaking at his death in 1828. The term might also be used for John Constable (1776–1837) or Eugène Delacroix (1798–1868), but usually
319-496: The Middle Ages that preceded, painters and sculptors were members of guilds, seeking commissions to produce artworks for aristocratic patrons or churches. The establishment of academies of art in the 16th century represented efforts by painters and sculptors to raise their status from mere artisans who worked with their hands to that of the classical arts such as poetry and music, which are purely intellectual pursuits. However,
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#1732790505647348-475: The Museum of Modern Art and National Museum of Western Art ). However, establishments that display art for other purposes, but serve no museum functions, are only called art galleries. The distinctive function of a museum is the preservation of artifacts with cultural, historical, and aesthetic value by maintaining a collection of valued objects. Art museums also function as galleries that display works from
377-497: The art world , art galleries play an important role in maintaining the network of connections between artists, collectors, and art experts that define fine art . The terms 'art museum' and 'art gallery' may be used interchangeably as reflected in the names of institutions around the world, some of which are called galleries (e.g. the National Gallery and Neue Nationalgalerie ), and some of which are called museums (e.g.
406-413: The adjacent neighborhood "south of Houston" ( SoHo ) which became gentrified in turn. Attempting to recreate this natural process, arts districts have been created intentionally by local governments in partnership with private developers as a strategy for revitalizing neighborhoods. Such developments often include spaces for artists to live and work as well as galleries. A contemporary practice has been
435-412: The art market. Art dealers, through their galleries, have occupied a central role in the art world by bringing many of these factors together; such as "discovering" new artists, promoting their associations in group shows, and managing market valuation. Exhibitions of art operating similar to current galleries for marketing art first appeared in the early modern period , approximately 1500 to 1800 CE. In
464-549: The artist and the gallery splitting the proceeds from each sale. Depending upon the expertise of the gallery owner and staff, and the particular market, the artwork shown may be more innovative or more traditional in style and media. Galleries may deal in the primary market of new works by living artists, or the secondary markets for works from prior periods owned by collectors, estates, or museums. The periods represented include Old Masters , Modern (1900–1950), and contemporary (1950–present). Modern and contemporary may be combined in
493-409: The arts as part of other missions, such as providing services to low-income neighborhoods. Historically, art world activities have benefited from clustering together either in cities or in remote areas offering natural beauty. The proximity of art galleries facilitated an informal tradition of art show openings on the same night, which have become officially coordinated as " first Friday events " in
522-456: The case of historical works, or Old Masters this distinction is maintained by the work's provenance ; proof of its origin and history. For more recent work, status is based upon the reputation of the artist. Reputation includes both aesthetic factors; art schools attended, membership in a stylistic or historical movement, the opinions of art historians and critics; and economic factors; inclusion in group and solo exhibitions and past success in
551-447: The category of Post-war art; while contemporary may be limited to the 21st century or "emerging artists". An enduring model for contemporary galleries was set by Leo Castelli . Rather than simply being the broker for sales, Castelli became actively involved in the discovery and development of new artists, while expecting to remain an exclusive agent for their work. However he also focused exclusively on new works, not participating in
580-531: The first indications of modern values regarding art; art as an investment versus pure aesthetics, and the increased attention to living artists as an opportunity for such investment. Commercial galleries owned or operated by an art dealer or "gallerist" occupy the middle tier of the art market , accounting for most transactions, although not those with the highest monetary values. Once limited to major urban art worlds such as New York, Paris and London, art galleries have become global. Another trend in globalization
609-575: The industrial history of Worcester, local geology, natural history, together with 19th- and 20th-century paintings, prints, and photographs. The Worcester Soldier galleries display the collections of the Worcestershire Regiment and the Queen's Own Worcestershire Hussars . Art gallery Among the modern reasons art may be displayed are aesthetic enjoyment, education , historic preservation , or for marketing purposes. The term
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#1732790505647638-456: The museum's own collection or on loan from the collections of other museums. Museums might be in public or private ownership and may be accessible to all or have restrictions on access. Although primarily concerned with visual art , art museums are often used as a venue for other cultural exchanges and artistic activities where the art object is replaced by practices such as performance art , dance, music concerts, or poetry readings. Similar to
667-443: The period before the modern; esp. a pre-eminent western European painter of the 13th to 18th centuries." The first quotation given is from 1696, in the diary of John Evelyn : "My L: Pembroke..shewed me divers rare Pictures of very many of the old & best Masters, especially that of M: Angelo..,& a large booke of the best drawings of the old Masters." The term is also used to refer to a painting or sculpture made by an Old Master,
696-471: The public exhibition of art had to overcome the bias against commercial activity, which was deemed beneath the dignity of artists in many European societies. Commercial art galleries were well-established by the Victorian era , made possible by the increasing number of people seeking to own objects of cultural and aesthetic value. At the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century there were also
725-434: The resale of older work by the same artists. All art sales after the first are part of the secondary market, in which the artist and the original dealer are not involved. Many of these sales occur privately between collectors, or works are sold at auctions. However some galleries participate in the secondary market depending upon the market conditions. As with any market, the major conditions are supply and demand. Because art
754-426: The scope of the term. Therefore, beyond a certain level of competence, date rather than quality is the criterion for using the term. In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, the term was often understood as having a starting date of perhaps 1450 or 1470; paintings made before that were "primitives", but this distinction is no longer made. The Oxford English Dictionary defines the term as "A pre-eminent artist of
783-969: The term as ranging "from the 14th to the early 19th century". The relevant part of the large and important collection of the Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium in their main building in Brussels was renamed in recent years as the Oldmasters Museum in Dutch and English, and Musée Oldmasters in French. It was previously called the "Royal Museum of Ancient Art" in English (French: Musée royal d'art ancien ; Dutch: Koninklijk Museum voor Oude Kunst ). Artists, most often from early periods, whose hand has been identified by art historians, but to whom no identity can be confidently attached, are often given names by art historians such as Master E.S. (from his monogram), Master of Flémalle (from
812-549: The use of vacant commercial space for art exhibitions that run for periods from a single day to a month. Now called "popup galleries", a precursor was Artomatic which had its first event in 1999 and has occurred periodically to the present, mainly in the Washington metro area . Old Master In art history , " Old Master " (or " old master ") refers to any painter of skill who worked in Europe before about 1800, or
841-545: Was established as a combined public library, museum, and School of Art and Science. The Worcestershire Regiment Museum collection moved from Norton Barracks to the Worcester City Art Gallery & Museum in 1970. In 2021 the Art Gallery & Museum received a donation of £300,000 from an unnamed donor. The gallery has a programme of contemporary art and craft exhibitions. Displays include
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