Learn about Art at the National Gallery

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Many people believe that they can't appreciate art because they don't know enough about it. If that's you, then it's time you did something to rectify your knowledge. One place where it is easy to learn a little bit more about painters and paintings is at the National Gallery . If you check out the events on the website you'll soon see that there is a choice of options to help you grasp a greater command of art, its disciplines and its history.

[ADVERT]If you are prepared to set aside anything between ten and ninety minutes you can join in a guided tour or sit and listen to a talk or a lecture led by the experts. Every day there are two guided tours lasting for one hour; these set off from the Sainsbury Wing of the Gallery and are a perfect introduction to the collection. To whet your appetite, here are a few events coming up during March. And if you don't want to leave the comfort of your armchair, there are online guides, including a virtual tour and monthly podcasts .

Mantegna's The Virgin and Child with Saints will be the focus of both a lecture and a drawing class on 1 March at 1pm


and Guercino's Cumaean and Samian Sibyl Paintings will be the subject of a ten-minute talk at 4pm on the same day. At 6.30 there will be an hour long curator's talk on Barocci: Brilliance and Grace. The three curators of the current Barocci exhibition will discuss their collaborative curatorship of this current display and reveal his creative processes, altarpieces, sketches and drawings.

On 4 March at 1pm Tim Bonyhady will tell the story of his grandmother, the focus of Klimt's portrait Good Living Street. This anticipates The Portrait in Vienna, a National Gallery exhibition that will open in October of this year.



In recognition of International Women's Day on 8 March Drawing Connections (between 1pm and 2.15pm) will analyse two paintings of women. One by a male artist: Rubens's Portrait of Susanna Lunden and one by a female: Elisabeth Louise Vigeé Le Brun's Self Portrait in a Straw Hat.



Moving on to the latter part of the month and Easter, there are several events concerned with religious paintings. On 27 March there is a ten-minute talk on Matteo di Giovanni's The Assumption of the Virgin



and the following day, Maundy Thursday, takes in a ninety-minute lecture on Delacroix's Christ on the Cross. The Saturday talk over the Easter weekend is another long one Triptych: Scenes from the Passion of Christ.



After attending a few of these sessions you will feel better equipped to explore the National Gallery's 2,300 masterpieces

Admission to the National Gallery is free, as are many of these events. Bookings, including for the free events, can be made through the Gallery's website.

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