Hertford House - The Wallace Collection, London, England

Herford House - The Wallace Collection is a museum in London, with a world-famous range of fine and decorative arts from the 15th to the 19th centuries with large holdings of French 18th-century paintings, furniture, arms & armour, porcelain and Old Master paintings arranged into 25 galleries.

It was established in 1897 from the private collection mainly created by Richard Seymour-Conway, 4th Marquess of Hertford (1800–1870), who left it and the house to his illegitimate son Sir Richard Wallace (1818–1890), whose widow, Julie, bequeathed the entire collection to the nation. The museum opened to the public in 1900 in Hertford House, Manchester Square, and remains there, housed in its entirety, to this day. A condition of the bequest was that no object ever leave the collection, even for loan exhibitions. Admission is free.

The Wallace Collection is a non-departmental public body.

Collections

The museum's collection numbers nearly 5,500 objects and is best known for its quality and breadth of eighteenth-century French paintings, Sèvres porcelain and French furniture.

The Wallace Collection also displays many other treasures, such as two paintings by Titian, five Rembrandts, nine Rubenses, four Van Dyck's, eight Canalettos, nineteen Bouchers, masterpieces by de Hooch, nine Teniers, Frans Hals, nine Murillos, two Velázquez and paintings by Domenichino, Cima, Daddi, Reni, Rosa, Thomas Gainsborough, Joshua Reynolds, Antoine Watteau, Nicholas Lancret, Jan Steen, Aelbert Cuyp and nine Guardis. The museum also holds a fine collection of arms and armour, featuring both European and Oriental objects, as well as displays of gold boxes, miniatures, sculpture and medieval and Renaissance works of art such as maiolica, glass, bronzes and Limoges enamels.

The works of art in the Collection comprise:===[1]

Paintings, watercolours and drawings 775
Furniture 528
Ceramics 510 European and Oriental arms and armour 2,370 Sculpture 466 Miniatures 334 Medieval and Renaissance works of art 363 Goldsmiths' work 120

Large Drawing Room - Contains some of the most spectacular works by the French furniture-maker, Andre-Charles Boulle

Part of the Wallace Collection's great ensemblage of Sèvres porcelain

Front State Room - Redecorated in the mid-1990s to appear as though it would have in the late-19th century

The Great Gallery in 2012, featuring Rubens' "Landscape With A Rainbow", portraits by Van Dyck, and other important works

Building

In 2000 the inner courtyard was given a glass roof a restaurant was started named "Cafe Bagatelle" after their collectors' chateau Bagatelle. The Wallace Restaurant is now run by Peyton and Byrne as a French-style brasserie. The architect was Rick Mather.[2]

Departments

Titian – Perseus and Andromeda, c. 1554–56

Diego Velázquez – Lady with a Fan

Rembrandt – The Artist's Son Titus, c. 1657

Anthony van Dyck – Porträt des Philippe Le Roy, 1630

Peter Paul Rubens – Christ's Charge to Peter, c. 1616

Antoine Watteau – A Lady at her Toilet, c. 1716–18)

Canaletto (Giovanni Antonio Canal) – The Bacino from the Giudecca, Venice, c. 1740

Thomas Gainsborough– Mrs Mary Robinson (Perdita), c. 1781

The Wallace Collection is split into six curatorial departments, Pictures and Miniatures, Ceramics and Glass, Sculpture and Works of Art, Arms and Armour, Sèvres porcelain and Gold Boxes and Furniture.
Pictures and miniatures[edit] The Wallace Collection's Old Master paintings represent some of the finest works of art in the world, executed by most of the leading artists of their period. The paintings include important works from all periods between the fourteenth to the mid-nineteenth century. The Wallace Collection is particularly strong in Dutch and Flemish paintings of the seventeenth century and in eighteenth and nineteenth-century French paintings, though there are also outstanding works by English, Italian and Spanish artists. Strengths of the collection include examples by Rembrandt, Rubens, Van Dyck, Canaletto, Gainsborough, François Boucher, Fragonard, Murillo, Titian, Poussin and Velázquez. The inventory of pictures, watercolours and drawings comprises all the major European schools. Paintings, drawing and watercolours from the Wallace Collection[edit] British, German, Spanish & Italian – 151 paintings, 60 drawings[3] French (19th Century) – 134 paintings, 57 watercolours[4] French (before 1815) – 144 paintings, 8 drawings and watercolours[5] Dutch – 173 paintings, 2 drawings[6] Flemish – 8 paintings[6] Dutch School Gerard ter Borch – 2 paintings; Aelbert Cuyp – 6 paintings; Gerrit Dou – 1 painting; Frans Hals – 1 painting; Meyndert Hobbema – 5 paintings; Pieter de Hooch – 2 paintings: A Boy Bringing Bread and A Woman Peeling Apples; Gabriel Metsu – 5 paintings; Adriaen van Ostade – 2 paintings; Rembrandt – 6 paintings; Jacob Isaakszoon van Ruisdael – 5 painting; Frans Snyders – 1 painting; Jan Steen – 5 paintings; Adriaen van de Velde – 2 paintings; Willem van de Velde the Younger – 8 paintings; Jan Weenix – 13 paintings; Philip Wouwerman – 6 paintings; English School Thomas Gainsborough – 2 paintings; John Hoppner – 1 painting; Sir Edwin Landseer – 4 paintings; Thomas Lawrence – 4 paintings; Joshua Reynolds – 12 paintings; J.M.W. Turner – 4 paintings; Flemish School Marcus Gheeraerts the Younger – 1 painting; Jan Mabuse – 1 painting; Hans Memling – 1 painting; Pieter Pourbus – 1 painting; Peter Paul Rubens – 9 paintings; David Teniers the Younger – 2 paintings; Anthony van Dyck – 4 paintings ; French School François Boucher – 20 paintings; Philippe de Champaigne – 4 paintings; François Clouet – 2 paintings; Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot – 1 painting; Eugène Delacroix – 2 paintings; Hippolyte Delaroche – 12 paintings; Gaspard Dughet – 1 painting; Jean-Honoré Fragonard – 8 painting; Claude Lorrain – 1 painting; Théodore Géricault – 1 painting; Jean-Baptiste Greuze – 19 paintings; Jean-Marc Nattier – 3 paintings; Nicolas Poussin – 1 painting; Théodore Rousseau – 1 painting; Jean-François de Troy – 2 paintings; Claude-Joseph Vernet – 2 paintings; Horace Vernet – 24 paintings; Jean-Antoine Watteau – 9 paintings; Italian School Canaletto, (Giovanni Antonio Canal) – 19 paintings; Giovanni Battista Cima da Conegliano – 2 paintings; Carlo Crivelli – 1 painting; Francesco Guardi – 9 paintings; Salvator Rosa – 1 painting; Andrea del Sarto – 1 painting; Titian (Tiziano Vecelli) – 1 painting; (Domenichino) – 1 painting; Spanish School Bartolomé Esteban Murillo – 8 paintings; Diego Velázquez – 2 paintings;