The Wallace Collection

23/06/2026

🎂 We have been open to the public for 126 years this June. To celebrate our anniversary month, journey back to the 19th century through our visitors’ book with Cronk Archivist Nicole Ioffredi.

Between 1876 to 1897, this book bore witness to guests including sculptor Auguste Rodin, the Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli and American art collector Isabella Stewart Gardner.

Disraeli, writing under the title 1st Earl of Beaconsfield, captured the magic of our home perfectly: ‘This palace of genius, fancy and taste’, he wrote when he visited in 1878.

20/06/2026

✨️Wander into the forest on a midsummer’s night at your own peril…

In a moonlit glade, winged infants pull at the gauzy sheet of a reclining nymph raised high on soft pillows.

She smiles knowingly as one puckish infant leans in close to her ear. Perhaps to whisper a secret, or watch as, bewitched by love-in-idleness, she drifts into slumber.

Painted by the English artist Richard Westall, this beguiling scene has long invited interpretation. Once thought to depict Venus and Cupid or The Waking of Aphrodite, it has more recently been associated with Titania, Shakespeare’s fairy queen, suspended between dream and enchantment in ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream.’

Westall is best remembered today for his portraits, in particular those he made for Romantic poet Lord Byron. He spent the last decade of his life as drawing master to Queen Victoria.

This painting was acquired by Francis Charles Seymour-Conway, 3rd Marquess of Hertford (1777–1842), who hung it in his bedroom here at Hertford House.

🧚‍♂️Perhaps it was the prospect of enchantment that appealed to the Marquess of Hertford – we can imagine the mischievous infants continuing their nocturnal revels long after the candles were extinguished, scattering strange dreams among the sleeping household.

Richard Westall, Nymph and Cupids, Probably 1793

19/06/2026

What shared history do you see in these two faces?

In anticipation of Father's Day, we look at this striking and poignant rendition of father and son. The older face you may recognise as Rembrandt. The younger face is his son, Titus van Rijn.

Titus (1641–68) was the only one of Rembrandt’s four children with his beloved first wife, Saskia, to survive infancy. Saskia died the year after Titus was born, aged 29, probably from tuberculosis.

Created around 1657, when Titus was about 16, the painting reflects a challenging time for the family. The previous year, Rembrandt was declared bankrupt, leaving the 15-year-old Titus and his stepmother, Hendrickje Stoffels, to manage the sale of his artworks.

Rembrandt sympathetically captures his young son’s serious demeanour, revealing the weight of his responsibilities managing his father’s affairs.

Titus wears a 16th-century Venetian costume adorned by a gold earring and chain. His fantastic beret beautifully complements the red highlights in his voluminous curls.

He went on to study painting with his father, but sadly died in 1668, just before the birth of his own daughter, Titia. Rembrandt himself died the following year and was buried in the Westerkerk, Amsterdam.

Father and son find each other in our East Gallery I.⁠

We’re open 10.00–17.00, and entry to our permanent collection is always free.⁠

🎨Rembrandt, Self-Portrait in a Black Cap, 1637
🎨Rembrandt, Titus, the Artist's Son, about 1657

17/06/2026

🎶 We celebrated ‘Winston Churchill: The Painter’ with a resplendent evening of orchestral magic for the first night of the Marylebone Music Festival 🎶

Thank you to Orion Orchestra, Elena Urioste and Toby Purser for their beautiful and deeply moving renditions of compositions including Edward Elgar’s ‘Salut d’amour’, Ralph Vaughan Williams’ ‘The Lark Ascending’ and to finish ‘Somewhere over the Rainbow’, in front of Rubens’ gleaming ‘Rainbow Landscape.’

Bravo Marylebone Music Festival and all those that made it another sublime performance!

💫 Discover all of our events: https://www.wallacecollection.org/whats-on/events/?query=&sort=&page=1

📷Edward Baxter www.noddingdog.uk

16/06/2026

16/06/2026

Hear our curator of paintings and co-curator of ‘Winston Churchill: The Painter’, Dr Lucy Davis, discuss our new exhibition with Anglotopia

Lucy shares the story of how Churchill came to paint, the three major artists who shaped his style — John Lavery, Walter Sickert, and William Nicholson — the single painting he made during World War II, the extraordinary Hallmark Cards world tour, and why the Wallace Collection is the perfect home for this once-in-a-lifetime show.

🔉Listen here: Anglotopia Podcast: https://podcast.anglotopia.net/podcast/anglotopia-podcast-episode-99-churchills-secret-life-as-a-painter-dr-lucy-davis-on-a-once-in-a-lifetime-exhibition-at-wallace-collection/

🎥Watch the video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tvb6hRgdYPI

🎟 Book your tickets to ‘Winston Churchill: The Painter’: https://www.wallacecollection.org/whats-on/exhibitions-displays/winston-churchill-the-painter/

Did you know that in addition to saving the free world, Churchill was also an accomplished painter? In this episode of the Anglotopia Podcast, Jonathan Thomas sits down with Dr. Lucy Davis — curat…

15/06/2026

More than 50 canvases on view in London detail the prime minister’s quieter moments away from wars, speeches and politics

12/06/2026

'Love Life' — David Hockney, 9 July 1937–11 June 2026

We are deeply saddened by the death of David Hockney. One of contemporary art's most beloved figures, we are proud to have worked with him and to have exhibited his paintings in our 2023 show 'Portraits of Dogs: From Gainsborough to Hockney.'

Between 1993 and 1995, Hockney painted forty portraits of his two dachshunds, Stanley and Boodgie, catching them eating, playing, napping, waking up. Easel always at the ready, he would dash over and work at speed the moment they settled into position. 'I make no apologies for the apparent subject matter … these two dear little creatures are my friends,' he wrote.

The series was born out of grief. Hockney had lost several close friends in quick succession and turned to his dogs as a source of solace. 'I wanted desperately to paint something loving ... I felt such a loss of love I wanted to deal with it in some way,' he recalled.

The tenderness of these portraits, and the vivid, joyful colour that runs through all his work, perfectly embody his motto: Love Life.

In 2023, our Director, Dr Xavier Bray, was fortunate enough to interview David Hockney about his canine friends.

🔈️For audio listen here: wallacecollection.org/media/media/David_Hockney_on_his_dogs.mp3

Director of the Wallace Collection Dr Xavier Bray says:

‘David Hockney’s paintings speak of the pleasure he took in life. He painted with vigour, driven by a restless curiosity and an eye for vivid and decorative imagery – raindrops running down a windowpane or a daffodil in his Normandy garden in spring.

‘The Wallace Collection was privileged to present a handful of his paintings of his two beloved dachshunds, Stanley and Boodgie, for our ‘Portrait of Dogs’ exhibition.

'We thank him for the joy he brought us all. His passing is truly the end of an era.’

🌈 David Hockney, Dog Painting 41, 1995 (detail) © David Hockney. Photo Credit: Richard Schmidt Collection The David Hockney Foundation ⁠
🌈 David Hockney, Dog Painting 19, 1995 © David Hockney. Photo Credit: Richard Schmidt Collection The David Hockney Foundation
🌈 David Hockney, Dog Painting 41, 1995 © David Hockney. Photo Credit: Richard Schmidt Collection The David Hockney Foundation

11/06/2026

🌊 What first strikes you about this scene?

In this unmistakably Mediterranean view, you glimpse between overhanging pine trees bisecting the composition in two almost parallel lines, their branches and foliage creating a patterned canopy.

Figures that have ambled up on the rocks look out over the brilliant sea, which is depicted in a combination of vivid blues and light greens, the surf added in white highlights.

Winston Churchill painted this scene in 1952 from the rocky coastal path at Cap d’Ail, from La Capponcina in the south of France, where he was staying with his friend Lord Beaverbrook.

While serving as Prime Minister for the second time (between 1951–1955), Churchill escaped here for a brief retreat of painting, swimming and continuing work on his war memoirs. It is one of the few paintings Churchill completed during his peacetime premiership.

The painting was exhibited at the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition in 1953 and in 1960, Churchill submitted it to the Royal Academy of Arts as his diploma work.

Having been appointed Honorary Academician Extraordinary in 1948, it was in keeping with tradition that every member donates a work to its permanent collection.

‘Cap d’Ail, Alpes-Maritimes’ is still a part of the Royal Academy’s permanent collection.

☀️ Come and soak in the views at Winston Churchill: The Painter.

🎟️Book your tickets now: https://www.wallacecollection.org/whats-on/exhibitions-displays/winston-churchill-the-painter/
Until 29 November

🎨 Sir Winston Churchill, Cap d’Ail, Alpes-Maritimes C489, 1952. Royal Academy of Arts, London. © Churchill Heritage Ltd. Photo: ©Royal Academy of Arts, London; photographer: John Hammond.

11/06/2026

✨📖 Book giveaway 📖 ✨

We are giving away ten copies of 'Painting as a Pastime', Churchill's timeless meditation on the joy of painting. The essay has been beautifully republished by Quarto with extended insights and anecdotes.

👉To enter, sign up to our newsletter: https://www.wallacecollection.org/newsletter/

The prize draw is open to Wallace Collection email subscribers. All current subscribers will be automatically entered.

Alternatively, if you do not wish to subscribe, you may also enter by email to [email protected] with the subject line ‘Painting as a Pastime prize draw.’

'Painting as a Pastime' by Winston Churchill, £12.99, Frances Lincoln.

📚 Available now in our museum shop and online.
Buy now: https://wallacecollectionshop.org/collections/winston-churchill-the-painter/products/painting-as-a-pastime

Book your tickets to the exhibition: https://www.wallacecollection.org/whats-on/exhibitions-displays/winston-churchill-the-painter/

Terms & Conditions:https://www.wallacecollection.org/documents/2524/Win_a_copy_of_Painting_as_a_Pastime_by_Winston_Churchill.pdf