Historical version 88 of Christ Church Picture Gallery (view current version)

  • 276172
  • Christ Church (Entrance via Oriel Square)
  • OX1 1DP
  • Jul - Sep (open every day) Monday - Saturday: 10.30am - 5pm Sunday: 2 - 5pm. Open all year but closed Tuesdays from Oct - Jul. Please refer to website for further details.

Christ Church is unique among the Oxford and Cambridge colleges in possessing an important collection of Old Master paintings and drawings, housed in a purpose-built Gallery of considerable architectural interest in itself. The collection consists of some 300 paintings and almost 2000 drawings and is strongest in Italian art from the 14th to the 18th century.

The internationally renowned drawings collection in the Picture Gallery at Christ Church is regarded as one of the most important private collections of Old Master drawings in the country. These small in-house exhibitions are changed about every three months to enable the public to see a varied selection from this part of the collection.

Current Exhibitions:

'Heroic Nakedness': 13 June – 15 October. This exhibition celebrates the human body as seen by Renaissance and Baroque artists. The show makes a tribute to the Olympic ideals and demonstrates, with over 30 drawings from Christ Church permanent collection, how artists explore the physical beauty of the human form.

'Salvador Dali's illustrations for Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland’' 27 June - 22 October

Lewis Carroll's 'Alice's Adventures in Wonderland' (published in 1865) is probably the best-known piece of literary nonsense ever written and Salvador Dali (1904 – 1989) is probably the best-known surrealist artist. It is not surprising, therefore, that Dali set out to illustrate Carroll's book. He worked on the project on and off for two years, and the water-colours which are the basis of the printed illustrations, were painted at his home in Cadaques in northern Spain. The finished work was published in 1969 by Maecenas Press Random House, New York.

The project brought together two of the most famous explorers of dreams and imagination in Western culture and culminated in 13 new illustrations for Lewis Carroll's 'Alice's Adventures in Wonderland' which are now on display at the Gallery.

Admission: £3/£2. Free to those who have Bod cards and Art Fund members.

This is version 88 (as of 2012-09-26 15:25:27). View current version. List all versions.