Public Art galleries -animal paintings

[Just2MoreSeasons]

Please could anyone share which public art galleries have paintings/sketches etc of animals and or a focus on the natural world.

My dd needs to visit some for the start of her GCSE course as a summer project. We live in south midlands so I've booked a place in Gloucester but I'm struggling to find anything else. We are in London for the day tomorrow so could call in somewhere - but I can't even find anywhere in London (the national gallery has people with a cat in their lap but I was hoping for three animal to be the focus.)

We will also he in York and near Guildford over the summer - had no luck finding anything there either.

I think I must be rubbish at googling. Can anyone help?
Thankyou

National Gallery.

Henri Rousseau - tiger
George Stubbs - Whistlejacket - racehorse

There must be another one there too.

This is the National Gallery search engine. Not everything that comes up will be on display, but there should be something.

https://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/search?q=animal&area=painting

This, for example: https://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/paintings/jan-van-kessel-the-elder-insects-with-common-hawthorn-and-forget-me-not

https://www.nationalgalleries.org/art-and-artists/4878#:~:text=Callum%20was%20a%20Dandie%20Dinmont,important%20trust%20fund%20for%20acquisitions.

I love this story about a dog in the National Gallery Scotland which is on permanent display.

Ashmolean Museum, Oxford:
The Forest Fire, Piero di Cosimo
The Hunt in the Forest, Paolo di Dono, called Uccello
Black Bear Cub in Snow, and plenty more

Natural History Museum? They have some art. My DD went there when she was doing her A level art. It's a great resource for looking directly at the source object of art too.

It's worth going to the National Gallery just to see Whistlejacket.

Agreed! When they acquired it, they projected an image of the painting right across the frontage of the gallery. It was a wonderful confident statement that art matters and a reminder to the teeming masses rushing through Trafalgar Square that the NG is always there and (thanks be) has free admission. I absolutely love it.

@Just2MoreSeasons Google "animals in paintings at the Tate London" and you will get masses of information, including which paintings can be seen where, suggested projects for students, painters that had an interest in animals, portraits including pets....etc etc.
Enough to keep an art student interested all summer long!

If you are going to London, then Natural History Museum has a large art collection which is unsurprisingly nature focussed.

If you do the National Gallery then Stubbs is the obvious choice, but also Dutch gallery will have a lot of flower paintings in, Impressionists are v outdoors focussed.

For something completely different go the Expressionist Blue Rider exhibition at Tate Modern. Most of the Blue Rider works are about nature, and Franz Marc in particular focussed on animals.

You are all absolutely brilliant!! I will work my way down the list.
Thankyou so much all

For Guildford then the Watts Gallery. They have a William De Morgan exhibition at the moment, hopefully they would have some of the fantastic pottery with animals and birds. The Cemetery Chapel would also fit the brief as the whole building is full of natural forms, kind of a forerunner of Art Noveau. Your DD might also like the fact that 2 female artists are strongly featured.

York Art Gallery is nice and not that big they have a Monet Waterlilly on loan at the moment.

There are a bunch of cow paintings at the Beaney Library in Canterbury, painted by Thomas Sidney Cooper (who was nicknamed Cow Cooper because of his habit of painting cows). There used to be also a Thomas Sydney Cooper gallery, but I think this has shut down now.

If you are going to the National Gallery, another one to add to the list is the Graham Children by Hogarth. I love the expression on the cat’s face as it eyes up the bird 😂

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Graham_Children

You can search by theme on the Tate Website. I imagine Tate Britain might have more animals than Tate Modern, although the have The Snail by Matisse.

Kew Gardens has a current exhibition by Marc Quinn that is inspired by nature and a permanent botanical art gallery.

www.kew.org/kew-gardens/whats-in-the-gardens/shirley-sherwood-gallery-of-botanical-art

Does it have to be art per se or can it be “design”? The V&A could also be a good resource if you are heading to the Natural History Museum. Or you could pop in Liberty and pick up some wallpaper/fabric samples of nature/animal inspired Liberty prints, House of Hackney and Timorous Beasties 😂

There's a small gallery that's just lovely called Nature in Art in Twigworth, Gloucestershire. Lovely tea room too.

There are some great classical animal paintings in The National etc and it is free, but if you only have one day and she's an GCSE level art student I'd take her to the summer exhibition at the Royal Academy (Piccadilly & opposite Fortnum and masons) as being more likely to be a fun day out for a teenager (and mum!) while fulfilling the brief.

I haven't been yet this year but every year I've been it's been wild and weird and fun containing so much more than paintings and prints, though plenty of them, and will fill her head with so many ideas, as well as allow her to see a huge range of brand new art ranging from traditional to contemporary and what's selling (look for little red stickers - multiples mean it's selling as a ltd edition print)
It also is a great introduction to galleries and curation (check out what color has been chosen for different gallery walls.) by everyone from unknowns to very famous artists, with floor to ceiling work.
It's been slated overall as not quite as vibrant this year but a poke around says there's plenty of fun and quirky stuff as usual.
There's over 17,000 works and plenty of animals. If she's under 16 she should be free, but if doing GCSE's late and 16 if your quick signing up as an under 25 she should get a half price ticket.

Lighting on this is grim but gives some idea: www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/348xs1t1xMC64v227tW0Yk7/tracey-emins-view-of-the-royal-academy-summer-exhibition

Might be of interest - https://www.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk/stories/best-show-top-dogs-our-collections
The Lady Lever in Port Sunlight is a beautiful gallery (but not in Liverpool - alhough the bbc thought it was)

The V&A has some Landseer dogs, like this one https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O69349/lion-a-newfoundland-dog-oil-painting-landseer-edwin-henry/

I can't tell you how much I appreciate all your comments and thoughts.
Collecting wallpaper samples from Liberty is a Genious idea too!
You are all wonderful. I think we need to dedicate a day to doing just art in London over the summer. I've booked the York art gallery will book The Guildford one too and I'd already booked the one someone mentioned in Gloucester (but didn't know about the nice tea room- thanks!)

She's just finishing year 9 so not yet started the GCSE but has been a summer project to do - which is to research (collage of sketches, paintings and magazines cut outs and now wallpaper 😉) what her theme will be so she can hit the ground running in September.

This is her painting a hibiscus this afternoon.

That's a lovely painting! And you're so lovely making so much effort to support her passion

I was going to suggest York but see you’ve booked it already. Sounds like you will have some lovely trips.

This exhibition is now over, but most of the dogs are back on display in the main collection

Portraits of Dogs: From Gainsborough to Hockney - The Wallace Collection

And for botanical, it's hard to beat the Marianne North collection at Kew Gardens

Marianne North Gallery | Kew