Explore collections

Collection-level records:

• Collection overview (Collection development policy)

  ASIAN DEPARTMENT

  The Asian Department was created in 2001 by bringing together the Indian and South-East Asian and East Asian collections with the Museum’s holdings of material from the Middle East, giving the Museum a coherent strategy for all its Asian collections for the first time. The collections, which together number about 150,000 objects, are extremely broad in scope chronologically, geographically and in terms of media. They include paintings in oil, watercolour and ink on canvas, paper and cloth; prints and photography; sculpture and carvings in stone, metal, wood, ivory, jade and other hardstones; metalwork and jewellery; arms and armour; dress, textiles and carpets; ceramics and glass; furniture and lacquer.

  The cultures of Asia are of great historical depth, while at different times and in different ways they have also both influenced, and been influenced by, western art and culture. Today, Asia is undergoing rapid change and is of great economic, political and cultural significance. The V&A thus has an important role to play in helping to interpret both historical and contemporary Asian culture to a growing and changing audience of national and international visitors.

  The V&A’s world-class Asian collections, together with those of institutions such as the British Museum and the British Library, make London one of the most important centres for the appreciation and study of Asian art and culture outside the various countries of origin. The V&A’s strengths lie in the decorative arts and design history, complementing the archaeological focus and numismatic strengths of the British Museum, and the British Library’s focus on manuscripts and the printed book. There is considerable consultation with other institutions in London and throughout the UK as we continue to develop our holdings with a national framework in mind.

  We continue to build and develop our collections through the acquisition of objects that illustrate and document the history and practice of art and design throughout Asia. In spheres where designers are active in international arenas, we work in consultation and collaboration with the V&A’s other curatorial departments. For all our acquisitions we pay close attention to provenance and follow UNESCO protocols.

  South, South-East Asia and the Himalayas

  The collections from the South Asian subcontinent (India, Bangladesh, Pakistan and Sri Lanka) range from ca. 3,000 BC to the present and number ca. 60,000 objects. The Museum also holds rich collections from the Himalayan region (Sikkim, Bhutan, Nepal and Tibet ca. 1,500 objects) and from most regions of SouthEast Asia (Burma, Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos and Indonesia, ca. 3,500 objects).

  The South and South-East Asian collections have their origins in the Museum of the East India Company.

  In the second half of the 19^th century the ‘India Museum’ was transferred to the newly established India Office and its broadly based historical collections were developed with a particular focus on arts, manufactures, and economic products, largely through acquisitions from international exhibitions. By the 1870s they included an unrivalled assemblage of contemporary decorative arts from all of what was then considered ‘Greater India’, i.e. those areas of South-East Asia and the Himalayan regions that had historically been influenced by India, or which were governed by British India. In 1879 the India Museum was dispersed, and its holdings came to South Kensington, where they joined the collections that had been developed at the Museum since initial acquisitions were made at the Great Exhibition of 1851.

  When the V&A’s collections were rationalised in 1909 and divided into material-based departments, the South Asian collections continued to be known as the ‘India Museum’ and were displayed in 20 rooms of the Eastern Galleries on the west side of Exhibition Road. In the mid-1950s, the Eastern Galleries were demolished, and the collection’s displays, now much reduced in scale, were moved to the main V&A building. The broad pattern of acquiring both historical and contemporary sculpture, painting and decorative arts and design has continued to this day resulting in a collection that is one of the largest and most important in the world.

  The V&A’s collection of Mughal court arts includes some of the most important pieces in the world and the collection of South Asian textiles (ca.10,000 items) is the largest and most important outside the region itself. A few very significant artefacts from the courts of Tipu Sultan and Maharaja Ranjit Singh make the V&A an important centre of study in both these fields. The collections of South Asian paintings and works on paper (ca. 5,000) and sculpture (ca. 5,000) are, along with those of the British Library and the British Museum respectively, among the finest in the western world. The V&A’s distinctive strengths also include furniture (ca. 300), musical instruments (ca. 200) and objects relating to the performing arts. The collection is strong in metalwork, arms and armour, and decorative arts of the second half of the 19^th century, especially items made for exhibition purposes, but does not comprehensively cover earlier periods. The Museum has smaller collections of works by 20^th – and 21^st-century artists and designers, (both those based in the Indian subcontinent and of South Asian origin working in the UK) and a significant holding of 20^th-century and contemporary Indian film posters – a genre which is important to an understanding of the modern and contemporary visual world of South Asia.

  In addition to the ca. 60,000 objects from South Asia already cited, the archive collection of 19^th-century (predominantly architectural site) photographs of South Asia, (ca. 20,000 prints and a large collection of negatives), along with photographic documentation of items of Indian art elsewhere in the V&A, is of enormous value.

  The Himalayan collection consists primarily of sculpture, tangkas (painted scrolls), and ritual and domestic vessels, but also includes important items of dress, personal ornament, arms and armour.

  From South-East Asia, the V&A holds a significant collection of 19^th-century material from Burma (Myanmar) and further strengths include a good collection of textiles and the UK’s most important collections of early sculptures from Indonesia, Thailand, Burma and Cambodia, and of metalwork from mainland South-East Asia.

  In the case of the historical collections, we aim to acquire selective and securely provenanced examples of sculpture of the Gupta and medieval periods; court art from the 16^th to 19^th century; paintings from both religious and secular traditions, early examples of South Asian textiles (including trade textiles); examples of 18^th – and 19^th-century furniture, metalwork and jewellery; and objects made for everyday use. One particular aim is to acquire objects that will enrich rotation displays in the South Asia Gallery in areas where there are few examples in the collection, such as Sultanate, Deccani and pre-Mughal Hindu painting. Opportunities will also be sought to acquire notable examples of significant genres of art from particular traditions, such as the Jain religion, where these are not well represented in the collection. We also hope to strengthen the Himalayan collection by the judicious addition of examples of early painting (12^th-14^th centuries) and sculpture, and of early 20^th-century textiles and jewellery which represent the traditional culture of the region. Regarding South-East Asia, we aim to build on our holdings of sculpture, painted works, textiles and jewellery.

  In the case of modern and contemporary works, we aim to increase our South Asian holdings in all media to reflect changes in society, technology and the use of raw materials. Recent years have seen the rapid development of a South Asian fashion industry, much of it based on a revival and elaboration of indigenous types of dress. We aim to collect and document key examples of modern and contemporary clothing, fashion and textiles. We also aim to acquire contemporary paintings, drawings and prints and examples of craft and product design relating to the domestic interior. With artists and designers whose approach is self-consciously international, we collaborate and consult with the V&A’s western collections. We are, for example, working with colleagues in the Photography Section of the Word and Image Department on a project to acquire contemporary South Asian photography. Regarding the Himalayas and South-East Asia, we plan to focus on the major strengths of the collections by acquiring selective examples of contemporary paintings and decorative arts, particularly textiles and jewellery.

  East Asia

  The collections from East Asia consist of ca. 68,000 items from China, Japan and Korea. They include objects from China (ca. 18,200 items) ranging from archaeological material of the 4^th millennium BC to 21^st-century items, Japanese material (ca. 48,850 items) primarily from the 16^th century to the present, and Korean material (ca. 950 items) from the Three Kingdoms period (57BC-668AD) to the present.

  The Museum has collected material from East Asia since its inception. Important donations and bequests during the course of the 20^th century – including from the Salting, Eumorfopoulos, Hildburgh, Alexander and Le Blond collections – coupled with determined and dedicated collecting by individual curators, led to major strengths. It was not until 1970, however, that the V&A’s East Asian collections were brought together under the care of specialist curators. These now constitute the largest and most extensive museum collection of East Asian ceramics (totalling ca. 9,000 items) and East Asian furniture and textiles (over 4,000) in the UK, while the collections of Chinese export art and Japanese prints (over 30,000), inrō (ca. 570 items) and lacquer (ca.2,000 items) are among the finest in the western world. Following the generous gift from Edwin Davies, CBE, the V&A now has the largest and most comprehensive collection of Japanese cloisonné enamels of any museum in the world, an area in which we continue to actively acquire. Further strengths are Chinese metalwork and carvings (ca. 1,500 items), Japanese netsuke (ca.860 items) and swords and sword fittings (over 5,000 items). The V&A has also built up a strong Korean collection despite the scarce availability of Korean artefacts during the colonial period (1910-45), Korean War (1950-53) and military regimes. Excellent ceramics, textiles, metalwork, furniture and lacquer have been acquired through generous donations and strategic purchases. We continue to collect historical material selectively to augment and enrich our existing collections and to allow for the rotation of sensitive material such as paintings, textiles and dress.

  Since 1980, there has been a consistent focus on modern and contemporary collecting. Chinese objects have been collected in a conscious effort to map the period and now constitute an impressive group perhaps unmatched outside China. We continue to actively collect contemporary Chinese art and design, particularly in the spheres of ceramics and dress. Japanese studio crafts are another particular strength, and our collection continues to grow. We also actively collect contemporary Japanese dress, interior and product design. Contemporary Korean ceramics and works in other media have also been steadily acquired since the establishment of the Korean Gallery in 1992, the first of its kind in London. Since the appointment of a full-time specialist curator for Korea in 2012 we have been able to pursue a more proactive collecting strategy aimed at the acquisition of objects that reveal innovative use of traditional cultural heritage and that showcase the dynamic contemporary craft and design scene in Korea, particularly in the fields of textiles and dress, ceramics, lacquer, metalwork and paper. We work closely with the other curatorial departments of the Museum in the acquisition of works by East Asian designers active in international arenas.

  Middle East

  The V&A holds over 18,000 items from the Middle East in the Islamic period. Until 2002, when staff with relevant expertise were appointed to the Asian Department, this world-class collection remained divided among the Museum’s materials-based departments. Transfer of the Middle Eastern collections to the Asian Department’s care has been carried out in tandem with gallery development and other projects and is now well advanced.

  The importance of the V&A collection in the field of Islamic art from the Middle East lies partly in its size and quality but also in the early date at which the collecting process began. The V&A was the first institution in the world to form a systematic and purposeful collection of Islamic art, the founders of the Museum seeing it as a key source for the reform of British design. Objects were first acquired by purchase from the European market and from international expositions and then, from the 1860s, by sending agents into the field. The foundation of the outstanding Iranian collections, for example, was the acquisition of pieces for the Museum by Sir Robert Murdoch Smith in Iran in the 1870s and 80s. The Museum also received major bequests from private collectors such as George Salting. Collecting continued on a less intensive scale after World War I, with a significant spate of acquisitions in the 1980s, when a number of major items were purchased at auction.

  In date, the collections begin with the rise of Islam in the 7th century. They are strongest in their representation of Iran, Turkey, Egypt, Syria and Iraq, but also include objects from Spain under Muslim rule, North Africa (Morocco to Libya), the Caucasus republics, and Afghanistan and the former Soviet Central Asia, most notably Uzbekistan. The collections include holdings of ceramics, textiles, metalwork and woodwork that are remarkable for their size and range, and the ceramics collection is internationally the most important and comprehensive of its kind (3,500 objects and ca. 8,000 sherds). It is particularly strong in Iranian wares and tiles of all countries. The textiles collection is of equally substantial range and importance (ca. 3,600 items) while the metalwork collection, which includes vessels, jewellery, and arms and armour, is also of world importance. The woodwork collection has areas of significance such as Mamluk carved wood. There are also smaller but significant collections of carving in ivory, rock crystal and stone, which include the unrivalled Fatimid rock crystal ewer. The arts of the book and graphic arts have not generally been a central concern of the Museum, but some areas of the collection, such as the holdings of Iranian architectural drawings from the 19th century, are of great importance. The Museum also has important holdings of architectural casts and one-for-one copies of 17th-century tilework from Isfahan, made in 1876.

  Collecting of Middle Eastern material falls into two categories. On the one hand, we seek to augment the historical collection by acquiring in fields not adequately represented. On the other, we have begun to collect modern and contemporary art and design from scratch.

  In terms of our historical collections, there are significant omissions. For instance, we wish to build on our good collection of metalwork, by acquiring objects made before the 13^th century and, in the area of non-Iranian metalwork, after the 16^th century. We also aim to collect items that illustrate production methods that are specific to our region and relevant to our collections and that have wider social or art historical meaning. Another issue to be addressed is the skewing of our 18^th and 19th-century collections towards tradition and away from modernity and we have begun to collect items from this period that show a full range of themes, both modern and traditional, and that can be seen as the forerunners of art and design in the 20th century.

  In collecting the 20th and 21st centuries, we seek items that reflect both the major currents in art and design in the region as well as political and social life more generally. Another major concern is the way in which contemporary artists and designers are inspired by Islamic tradition. This is the theme of the Jameel Prize, a biennial international award and, along with other contemporary works, we aim to acquire pieces from the Prize exhibitions that are produced by artists and designers from the Middle East.

  In making 20th- and 21st-century acquisitions, the Asia Department works with colleagues within the Museum and with other national and regional institutions. The Museum’s collection of contemporary photography from the Middle East, for example, is held by the Photography section of the Word and Image Department, but it was formed with our assistance and the co-operation of the British Museum, with most of the acquisitions generously funded by The Art Fund

  DESIGN, ARCHITECTURE AND DIGITAL DEPARTMENT

  The Design, Architecture and Digital Department (DAD), formed in 2015, is the youngest of the V&A’s collecting departments. DAD collections encompass industrial, product, furniture and digital design, architecture and urbanism.

  In its collecting, DAD seeks to engage with the work of the contemporary creative industries and reflect the concerns of a changing society. DAD’s collecting priorities are to consider design within the context of society, to document important global shifts in the practices and processes of design and show connections between the designed world and current socio-political concerns. DAD’s collection is international, showing the global circulation of objects from production to consumption, and the impacts of globalisation on labour, how things are made and the environment. It is diverse and inclusive, reflecting multiple voices and viewpoints (of gender, age, race, class, sexuality and ability), and scales and modes of practice, from the DIY to the mass-produced.

  DAD’s emphasis is primarily on contemporary collecting. However, where appropriate, to develop the collections, it also collects historical material. DAD shares responsibility for 20^th– and 21st-century furniture and product design with Furniture, Textiles and Fashion (FTF). DAD includes the Designs section, which is responsible for the collection of design drawings and models. The Designs collection ranges from the 14th-century to the present day and includes the collection of architectural drawings and models. The Designs section is matrix-managed with WID, in whose stores the Designs collection is located.

  DAD is the lead department for the V&A+RIBA Architecture Partnership, initiated in 2001, which offers access to two world-class architectural collections via the Architecture Gallery, the Architecture Display Gallery and the Study Room. The DAD team also developed ‘Rapid Response Collecting’, an acquisition strand that is reactive to international events, and enables the collection and immediate display of objects that articulate important moments in contemporary design and manufacturing.

  The subject areas covered by DAD are not exclusive of one another or defined by medium or geography, and DAD curators work across the wide field of design to explore relevant, contemporary issues and new practices. DAD curators collaborate with colleagues in other departments also collecting contemporary material. Digital design (as process, interface and object), for example, is central to all areas of contemporary art and design collected by the Museum. DAD, in its collecting work, therefore overlays and complements the collecting strategies of other departments.

  In addition to collecting in accordance with the priorities outlined above, the development of DAD’s collection also seeks to collect in support of other activities in the museum, including displays and exhibitions, FuturePlan gallery projects, and V&A East.

  A history of contemporary collecting

  Contemporary collecting has been at the heart of the V&A’s mission since its first director Henry Cole founded the Museum in 1852 to promote economic growth in Britain through design and to showcase new products, exhibiting contemporary objects alongside historical ones. However, for the next 100 years, the museum’s resources were concentrated mainly on building up historical collections and there was no sustained museum-wide effort to make late 19^th– and 20th-century collections representative (most departments had an unofficial ‘fifty-year rule’ against purchasing recent objects). The exception was the Circulation Department, which operated from 1909 until closure following government cuts in 1977, which collected contemporary objects for temporary exhibitions and an extensive touring programme to regional museums, art schools, galleries and libraries.

  In 1975, then director Sir Roy Strong allocated a special fund to all departments to collect post-1920s objects and, on the Circulation Departments demise, Keepers took an active role in ‘strengthening the museum’s representation of twentieth-century design’ in preparation for a designated Twentieth Century Gallery. From 1982-1986 the V&A hosted the ‘Boilerhouse’ project, operated independently by the Conran Foundation, which explored current manufacturing in contemporary exhibitions, and collected contemporary objects before the project broke away (taking its collection with it) to become the Design Museum.

  In 1989, when the Board of Trustees allocated half of the museum’s annual purchase grant to 20thcentury objects, the centrality of collecting contemporary design was reasserted in an attempt to reconnect with Henry Cole’s founding vision for the museum, as well as widen the museum’s base within the creative industries and serve a younger audience, providing inspiration for all. In 2002, a new Contemporary Team was established to present an active, innovative and inter-disciplinary programme of displays, installations, events and exhibitions, including the monthly Friday Late evenings, and in 2007 the Porter Gallery became the hub of a designated contemporary programme.

  In 2012, the Contemporary Team was restructured and the following year a collections-based section within an expanded Furniture, Textiles and Fashion (FTF) department was established: the Contemporary Architecture, Design and Digital (CADD) section. This reorganisation sought to embed the museum’s contemporary activities even further within the collections and engage in new ways with the world of contemporary architecture, design, manufacturing and digital design. In 2015, this became the Design, Architecture and Digital Department (DAD), a collections department, with a clear mandate for the contemporary.

  Collecting Design

  Since its inception as a department in 2015, DAD has made a number of industrial and product design acquisitions ranging from lighting to mobile phones, personal computers to smart thermostats and drones. These acquisitions show important instances of mass manufacture, innovative design practices and new processes of production and consumption.

  There are examples of mass-produced objects in many of the V&A’s collections, including Ceramics and Glass, Metalwork, Furniture and Woodwork, as well as Asia. However, it has not been the remit of any department to focus on serially produced objects, particularly not object types, such as electronics and lighting, that sit outside of a purely material and geographic focus. As the consumption of our core object types and materials moved in the 20^th century to mass-produced objects, and as the design professions developed objects powered by batteries, electricity and petrol, the V&A’s collection lost its connection to contemporary design practice and the consumption patterns of wider society.

  Throughout the 20th century, the majority of the V&A’s industrial design objects were acquired through the Circulation Department, in particular following the Second World War when developments in manufacturing methods and the scale of production, and with that the role of the designer, altered drastically. Objects in this field include, for example, injection-moulded chairs and vacuum-formed crockery. From the late 1950s to the early 1970s, the museum also acquired examples of industrial design from the Council of Industrial Design through the gift of works by the winners of the Design Centre Award. These include washing machines, lighting, gardening tools, small electronics and products designed for the office environment. When the Circulation Department closed in 1977 these objects were dispersed across other collecting departments and the coherence of this collection was lost.

  When the new Twentieth Century Gallery opened in 1992 the curators included types of industrial design not previously collected or displayed in a permanent gallery context, including stereo equipment and household appliances. However, the focus waned once the gallery project was completed and therefore the collection is patchy and does not reflect changes in manufacturing and consumption of the last 30 years.

  Collecting Architecture

  In 2001, the V&A entered into a collaboration with the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) known as the V&A+RIBA Architecture Partnership. The Architecture Partnership provides public access through the Study Rooms, the Architecture Gallery and the Architecture Display Gallery to two world-class collections. The bulk of the RIBA’s drawings are stored at South Kensington, though they remain a separate collection from the V&A’s collection and are looked after by the RIBA’s team of curators and conservators. The RIBA’s architectural archives, photographs and books are stored and accessed at Portland Place and at an off-site storage centre.

  In 2015, with the creation of DAD, responsibility for the V&A+RIBA Architecture Partnership (and therefore for the management of the shared spaces of the Architecture Gallery and Architecture Display Gallery) was transferred to the department. The museum restated its commitment to its architectural collections, and introduced a new emphasis on urbanism and interest in the role architecture plays in shaping society. The Designs section was moved from the Word and Image Department to DAD, though the collection – which includes the collection of architectural drawings, which is one of the designated national collections – is housed in the WID stores and continues to be matrix-managed with WID.

  DAD curators liaise closely with the RIBA as part of the V&A+RIBA Architecture Partnership to ensure that collecting by either party does not infringe on the remit of the other institution, and to ensure that potential donations or purchases find the most appropriate home. Architectural archives have traditionally been collected by the RIBA rather than the V&A, except in some cases where the individual’s practice has also extended to other areas of design, or where the archive has not fallen within the RIBA’s collecting remit. In some exceptional cases, and in consultation with the RIBA, the V&A has collected specific architectural archives. It is expected that the acquisition of architectural archives will remain an exceptional occurrence.

  Architecture has been collected from the earliest days of the Museum in the form of architectural drawings, models, photographs, plaster casts and original building fragments. A number of the Museum’s architectural holdings derive from the collection of the Architectural Museum, founded in 1851, which was intended to be the ‘National Museum of Architecture’. It was resident at the South Kensington Museum from when the latter opened in 1857 until 1869, where its casts, photographs and original fragments complimented the South Kensington Museum’s collection of ‘Construction and Building Materials’.

  In 1869, the Architecture Museum (renamed the Royal Architectural Museum) moved to separate premises, but when it closed permanently in 1916, the bulk of its collection of casts and original fragments was given to the V&A, where the items were dispersed into the various departments. Architectural collections at the V&A have always been held across the departments, depending on their material (e.g. plaster models in Sculpture; wooden models in Furniture; ironwork in Metalwork; drawings and mixed-media models in Word and Image). Architecture is still collected across other departments in the museum as well as DAD (for example, architectural fragments in FTF and SMCG; posters in WID; designs for theatres in T&P; models in Asia) and the Architecture section therefore liaises closely with those departments as appropriate.

  Collecting Digital Design

  Since its establishment in 2015, digital design has been part of the collecting remit of DAD. In the 21^st century, it is vital to collect digital design to understand its impact on design and society today, in the recent past and into the future. Digital design consists of but is not limited to: product design, software and physical computing; systems and industrial design; web design and social media; interaction, interface and information design; videogames and communications design; new media and computer programming. Digital design works across both the physical and digital domain, and intersects with other forms of design, for example, architecture, textiles and ceramics, furniture and fashion, among others.

  The presence of networked technologies, such as computers, smartphones and the internet, has transformed the ways in which design is produced, applied and disseminated. The rise of design that is born digitally or mediated through digital means has had a significant impact on public life and culture, and DAD seeks to acquire objects that reflect this.

  Digital design works between the physical (computer terminals, personal devices such as the iPhone) and the abstract (the internet, data, digital media, software and applications). DAD’s digital design collection will work to make the intangible and immaterial (that which we cannot immediately touch or see) tangible through objects that show evidence of, or make present, the existence of a digitally enabled and mediated world. This may be through collecting the work of artists and speculative designers that surface challenges around digital design or collecting user-generated design.

  The museum has a long history of engaging with and collecting digital design. Digital work is also collected by the digital art section in WID, and hardware, electronic devices and computing are also collected by the Furniture and Woodwork section in FTF, and Metalwork section in SMCG, and the Asia Department. The Museum of Childhood has also collected a small number of digital objects, including games consoles and videogames. From the early 2000s, WID have collected the work of digital art practitioners, documenting computer-generated design and art from the 1950s onwards. Holdings include works on paper, books, catalogues, archival material and ephemera, as well as a growing number of born-digital works. The acquisition of the Computer Arts Society Collection and the Patric Prince collections brought national significance to the V&A’s holdings of digital art.

  As designers increasingly work with digital tools, digital collecting is important for all departments and sections within the museum. For example, the collection of tools such as AutoDesk’s ‘AutoCAD’ computer aided design software will enable our Designs and Architecture collections to be better contextualized within contemporary digital practice.

  Rapid Response Collecting

  In 2014, Rapid Response Collecting was launched by the Contemporary Architecture, Design and Digital (CADD) section as a new acquisitions activity, and since 2015 has been the responsibility of DAD. It is a reactive mode of collecting that enables the acquisition and immediate display of designed things that articulate important moments in the recent history of design and manufacturing.

  Rapid Response acquisitions are brought into the museum at the time when they are the subject of public and/or critical discussion. Standing as evidence of social, political, technological and economic change, these objects expand the definition of design and further public understanding of the role it plays in contemporary society. Acquisitions to date include a 3D-printed firearm which changed public understanding of distributed manufacturing, a smart thermostat designed to learn behaviours and automatically regulate heating consumption in the home, a 2016 Vote Leave campaign leaflet which used the National Health Service graphic identity as a means to convey political messages, a mosquito emoji created as part of a public health campaign, and a pair of camera-enabled sunglasses that mark a step toward ubiquitous computing.

  All new acquisitions are put on immediate display and the reasons why an object has been collected at a given moment in time are clearly articulated. Colleagues from across the museum and members of the public are encouraged to suggest objects for acquisition and this invitation serves as a means to bring in new and diverse forms of expertise. In operating at all times in public, Rapid Response Collecting seeks to foster discussion about what the museum should collect, and the role it can play in helping navigate the realities of the digital age. Although at times of modest material value, Rapid Response Collecting objects are important and often newsworthy acquisitions, either because they advance what design can do or because they reveal how we live together today and how we might live tomorrow.

  FURNITURE, TEXTILES & FASHION DEPARTMENT

  History and collections

  The Furniture, Textiles and Fashion Department was formed in 2001. It amalgamated the two former departments of Furniture and Woodwork and Textiles and Dress, underlining the connections between these materials and media, synergies behind past and present collecting, and future ambitions for closer collaboration.

  Objects from Western Europe dominate all these collections, with small holdings from other parts of the world (except Asia). The Furniture and Woodwork collection comprises furniture from the medieval period to current times, alongside architectural woodwork and plasterwork, musical instruments and smaller items in wood and leather. It is unmatched in its breadth and quality and one of the largest collections of historic furniture in the world. The Textile collection is the world’s largest of its kind, chronologically and geographically wide-ranging, with textiles dating mainly from the 3^rd century CE to the present day. The Fashion collection is the premier collection in the UK, consisting of fashionable clothes and accessories from the last five hundred years.

  Scope and collecting

  The Department holds more than 84,000 objects. We continue the long-established tradition of collecting both historical and contemporary objects, focussing mainly on high-style design, manufacture or craftsmanship and seeking objects that tell intriguing stories not only about design processes, cutting edge technology and designers and makers, but also about those who commissioned, owned or used them. New Museum projects, including gallery renovations and temporary exhibitions, regularly provide opportunities to make complementary acquisitions that enhance our story of art and design and its interpretation for our visitors. In recent years, the V&A website has facilitated fuller interaction with wider and distant audiences, disseminating V&A expertise in and information about the collections and special exhibitions, as well as eliciting responses, knowledge and offers of acquisitions from our audiences.

  Like other V&A curatorial departments, we acquire through donation as well as purchase. Our focus overall is on exceptionally fine, objects with a clear provenance and those that otherwise illuminate design of their period. While we generally collect objects, which lead rather than follow taste, the changing nature of design and consumption since the Victorian era, and especially in the 20^th and 21^st centuries, has meant that our collecting in more recent decades covers a wider range of society.

  Furniture and Woodwork

  The Furniture and Woodwork collection is one of the largest collections of historic Western furniture in the world and is unmatched in breadth and quality. It has traditionally been referred to as the National Collection of furniture. Unlike most major European furniture collections, it does not have its origins in a former royal collection. While the UK is fortunate to have many institutions with fine collections of furniture, most of these—many of which are now Arts Council Designated Collections—are much smaller and narrower in scope.

  Scope

  The geographical and chronological range of the Furniture and Woodwork collection is unique. Its greatest strengths lie in the holdings of British furniture made between 1700 and 1900: Georgian, Regency, Gothic Revival, Aesthetic, and Arts and Crafts furniture. Other areas in which the collection is internationally strong are French 16^th-century woodwork, late medieval moulded leather, gilt leather panels, Western European musical instruments from the Renaissance to the late 19^th century, French 18^th-century case furniture, International Exhibition furniture and Art Nouveau furniture from the Paris World’s Fair of 1900 (Donaldson Collection). In certain areas, such as 18th-century furniture from the German states or 15thcentury Italian furniture, we have examples which are outstanding though relatively few in number. Our international 20th-century holdings as a group are rivalled by perhaps only one other institution (the Vitra Design Museum), and are notably rich in areas such as the Omega Workshops, the Wiener Werkstätte and Modernist furniture by leading designers such as Eileen Gray and Marcel Breuer, and also includes icons of popular culture such as Salvador Dalí and Edward James’s Mae West Lips sofa.

  The Furniture and Woodwork collection contains more than 11,000 objects, dating from the medieval period to the present day, with a small quantity of late Roman, archaeological woodwork. Most are from western Europe or have strong connections to Western cultures, including those shaped by patterns of colonialism and global trade. The department’s collection of woodwork produced in Islamic centres was transferred to the Asian Department in 2018. Although moveable furniture forms the core of the collection, there are also substantial holdings of interior architectural woodwork and plasterwork. We have also collected musical instruments, leatherwork and smaller decorative items in wood and papiermâché. With such an extensive collection, considerations of space are always important, so certain large furniture types such as beds, library bookcases, office desks or extensive sets of furniture tend to be represented by relatively few examples. The collecting of clocks is shared with the Metalwork collection according to case materials, reflecting the V&A’s interest in aesthetic rather than technical design (which is the province of the British Museum).

  During more than 160 years our collecting has encompassed many and varied approaches to design history but the landmark opening of the Dr Susan Weber Furniture Gallery in 2012 powerfully reinforced the special attention we give to the ways in which furniture has been made and decorated. It serves as a primary platform for the deeper understanding of furniture-making in the West and is backed up by extensive online resources representing many aspects of the collection.

  National Role

  The Furniture and Woodwork Collection forms part of the wider national collection held in museums, historic houses, churches and public buildings throughout the UK. We are particularly proud of our programme of long-term loans to dozens of venues around the UK, involving hundreds of pieces of furniture. Here they are seen, studied and enjoyed in contexts very different to the museum’s galleries, and by visitors with different interests and motivations. We maintain strong, collaborative relationships with regional museums and other heritage organisations such as Historic England and The National Trust. The V&A has always encouraged and responded to the strategic collecting of furniture by other public institutions. Over many decades this has enriched a constellation of mutually complementary collections such as those held by the Wallace Collection, Temple Newsam House, Leeds, the Lady Lever Art Gallery (National Museums Liverpool), the Burrell Collection, Glasgow and the Bowes Museum, Barnard Castle. Our activities have also responded to the pressure on regional museums which has caused them to adopt ever more selective collecting policies. Whereas some institutions, such as The Wilson, Cheltenham (for Cotswold furniture and, more widely, the Arts and Crafts movement), and the Judges’ Lodgings, Lancaster (for pieces by Gillows), acquire objects representing the history of their own local craft or industry, many other areas and aspects of production have become neglected. As a result of this we have taken a particularly active role in many different areas to ensure that the V&A collection is as representative as possible of high design from all major centres.

  In the past, some items have been acquired with the specific intention of returning them on loan or by transfer to other institutions. In the case of furniture, examples include the Mary of Modena bed, transferred to Historic Royal Palaces, a state bed from Boughton House given by the Duke of Buccleuch in 1916, and now returned on loan, and the giltwood table designed by John Vardy, now shown in Spencer House, London, together with the suite of chairs designed by him for the Painted Room. With the creation of the British Galleries in 2001 came a long-awaited chance to loan, and subsequently transfer to Sizergh Castle, Cumbria (National Trust) the 16th-century panelling and bed sold from the house in the 1890s. The allocation to the V&A of furniture under the Acceptance in Lieu scheme has brought outstanding furnishings at Longleat, Houghton Hall and Harewood House into the collection in recent decades, ensuring their preservation for the nation while remaining in situ.

  History of collecting furniture and woodwork

  Although Western furniture is now seen as the core of the Furniture and Woodwork collection, it originated (as did most collections in the museum) in the purchase of fine examples of woodworking techniques/craftsmanship for the Government Schools of Design at Somerset House in the 1840s. The earliest acquisitions, of contemporary French parquetry and carving from the Paris Exhibition of 1844, were typical of the kind of material acquired in the first twenty years of the museum’s life. Though historical pieces were acquired from 1848 onwards, the emphasis for acquisitions of all dates was on technical excellence and the value of such pieces as examples for current practitioners. Purchases included European and Asian woodwork of all kinds, with lacquer and carving particularly strongly represented. It was the Great Exhibition of 1851 that prompted the acquisition of contemporary furniture, both British and from continental Europe, but again, technical virtuosity was the prime criterion for selection.

  A powerful tool in the development of the Furniture and Woodwork collection in the 19^th century was the acquisition of complete personal collections. Amongst the largest of these were the Soulages Collection of Italian and French Renaissance objects (acquired between 1859 and 1865) and the Jones Collection of predominantly 18th-century fine and decorative arts (bequeathed in 1882). Such additions continued in the 20^th century, including the Bettine, Lady Abingdon Collection of twenty-four pieces or pairs of French Empire furniture, bequeathed by Mrs T.R.P. Hole in 1986.

  From the 1880s onwards, the preference for highly decorated continental furniture and woodwork gradually gave way to a developing taste for English furniture made before the 19^th century.

  At the same time, the interest in contemporary furniture waned, as the fashion for antique collecting gripped the middle classes. From this time, for more than a generation, the museum concentrated on acquiring British furniture of the 16^th to the 18^th centuries. It was in this period (1890–1930) that the Museum acquired many of its period rooms, which became a fundamental and very popular aspect of the displays. Currently, twelve examples are on exhibition, whole or in part (nine in the British Galleries and three in Europe 1600-1800), and with a conscious variety of methods of presentation which acknowledge varying levels of completeness. The creation of V&A East provides opportunities for the redisplay of others. As a result of the greater protection for historic interiors in recent decades and the large amount of space that complete interiors require, period rooms are acquired very rarely, as with Frank Lloyd Wright’s Kaufmann office, acquired by gift in 1974, and the Frankfurt Kitchen designed by Margarete SchütteLihotzky, acquired in 2005 for display in an exhibition.

  Contemporary collecting, which had formed such an important aspect of the museum’s acquisition policy in its early years, was almost entirely abandoned in 1909. The long series of acquisitions from international exhibitions in the 19^th century had culminated in the presentation by Sir George Donaldson of a collection of Art Nouveau furniture that had been shown at the 1900 Exhibition in Paris. Such was the public criticism this generated that contemporary furniture collecting was not resumed systematically until the 1960s, although some pieces had been courageously collected by the Circulation Department during the 1920s and 1930s. These were distributed to the appropriate material-based departments, including Furniture and Woodwork, when the Circulation Department was disbanded in 1977. Since the late 1980s the collecting of contemporary furniture has been re-established as a high priority, and since 2015 this has been carried out in co-operation with the Design, Architecture and Digital Department.

  Textiles

  The Textile collection is designated as the National Collection. Like the Furniture and Woodwork collection, it differs from many fine and well-established national collections in Europe in terms of its international coverage over a long historical period. Its designation as a National Collection is taken as representing a support role for the many smaller collections of textiles held by museums throughout Britain. In recent year, few regional museums, other than the Whitworth Art Gallery in Manchester, have been able to maintain and develop collections of textiles with a wide scope, leaving the V&A with the responsibility for maintaining the breadth of the nation’s collections.

  Scope

  The Textiles collection is the world’s largest and most wide-ranging of its kind. Many of its sections are remarkable for their variety and comprehensiveness. It includes examples from every continent except Asia and Antarctica, the majority from Western Europe. Most of the collection extends in date from the 3^rd century CE to the present day, while a small number of archaeological textiles dates as far back as ancient Egypt. The collection of British textiles is the finest in the world and includes the widest possible range of objects, from samples from manufacturers’ or salesmen’s books through small, exquisite items of dress or personal adornment to large furnishings.

  History of collecting textiles

  The Museum’s Textile collection began with the formation of study collections for the Government Schools of Design in 1842. These focussed on materials and techniques (animal and plant fibres) and decorative methods (woven, embroidered, printed and lace). As that collection grew, there was a revival of interest in historical patterns and in their potential for adaptation. When the Museum was founded in 1852, medieval and renaissance textiles were acquired, many of which had survived in the form of church vestments. There was also sustained interest in the manufacture of lace, with attempts at reviving the lace industries in several countries in the middle of the 19^th century. The Museum responded by acquiring and exhibiting many fine examples. It also acquired contemporary woven and printed textiles from the Great Exhibition of 1851 and the Paris Exhibitions of 1855 and 1867. The Museum’s initial emphasis, however, had been on the acquisition of pre-19^th-century material, partly because contemporary textiles did not conform to the principles of ‘good design’ then championed by museum curators and design reformers. The Museum showed little interest in contemporary embroidery, probably reflecting its original concern with the manufacturing industries rather than with craft production.

  During the 19^th century the Museum made individual purchases, received gifts and bequests. It also acquired many large collections of historical textiles, including 500 medieval and renaissance textiles from the Bock collection in 1863, and 450 16^th– and 17^th-century European textiles from the Forrer collection in 1877.

  From the beginning of the 20^th century to the 1930s, the Museum collected textiles from the period 1600 to 1750. English domestic embroidery from the 17^th century is well represented and includes large furnishing fabrics as well as small items of dress. The collection of 17^th–century European textiles is large and extraordinarily varied, while the 700 18^th-century, Greek and Turkish embroideries from the Dawkins collection, purchased in 1950, is unrivalled in scale and quality in Europe. In 1931 the Museum received as a bequest Alfred Maudslay’s 19^th-century Guatemalan and Mexican textiles, collected in the 1890s.

  More recently, in the second half of the 20^th century, the Museum benefited from re-organization within the British textile industry, acquiring major collections of 18^th–, 19^th– and 20^th-century textiles from leading UK manufacturers. They include 1,215 textiles and pattern books from Warners in 1972 and, subsequently 87 textiles from Mortons/Courtaulds in 1977, 73 textiles from Hull Traders in 1989, 157 samples from The Wilton Royal Carpet Factory in 1992, about 1,150 lengths of furnishing fabrics from Heals in 1999, and an archive of over 6,000 items covering a wide range of manufacturers and dates from Courtaulds in 2001.

  Collecting contemporary textiles, which had an erratic early history, was almost entirely abandoned in 1909 when it became the responsibility of the Circulation Department. In 1977 the Textiles department inherited the Circulation Department’s textile collection and once again resumed contemporary collecting. In 1934 the Museum had acquired the collections of the British Institute of Industrial Art, which had collected contemporary textiles on an annual basis from 1919 to 1932. It undertook to continue the tradition by collecting those textiles which were judged to be the best of each year’s international production. In this way an extensive and unique collection of 20^th-century textiles of both industrial and craft production grew to complement the historical collection. In 1979 and 2002 many fabric samples previously held in the Manchester Design Registry were acquired to enhance the collection of early 20^th-century textiles. The Textile collection is the world’s largest and most wide-ranging assemblage of such material.

  In the 21^st century, we have continued to add to the collection of historical textiles when exceptional items come on the market, often unexpectedly and in connection with exhibitions or the presence of an artist-in-residence.

  Fashion

  The Fashion collection is designated the National Collection and is one of the largest in the world, rivalled only by the Costume Institute of the Metropolitan Museum in New York, the Musée de la Mode et du Textile, the Musée Galliera in Paris, MOMU in Antwerp and the Kyoto Costume Institute in Japan. Its holdings consist mainly of European fashionable dress and accessories from the last 500 years. It has grown considerably in importance since the 1970s, attracting both scholarly interest and remaining one of the V&A’s most popular collections with general visitors. The material dating from 1600 to 1800 is the largest collection in the world, while the collection of 20^th-century sub-cultural fashion is unique in range and size.

  Scope

  The Fashion collection spans five centuries, its strengths lying in the period from the 18^th century onwards, with some rare pieces dating from the 17^th century. Contemporary holdings include American and Japanese fashion. Like the Textile collection, the Fashion collection has groups of objects that are important for their depth of coverage, such as 18^th-century men’s waistcoats, 1930s evening wear, postwar couture, 1960s daywear, fashion dolls, shawls and wedding dresses. It includes many outstanding items, with an emphasis on women’s dress and formal dress, including two magnificent court mantuas from the 1740s, evening gowns by Worth, a Charles James padded satin jacket of 1937, the seminal New Look suit ‘Bar’ by Christian Dior, and Vivienne Westwood’s ‘mock-croc’ blue platform shoes. Twenty-first century fashion acquisitions include the work of Giles Deacon, Mary Katrantzou, Nicholas Kirkwood, Alexander McQueen and Dries Van Noten.

  History of collecting dress

  The history of dress did not figure in the hierarchy of arts when the Museum was founded. Garments were nonetheless acquired as early as the 1840s but only if the textile were considered significant. Gradually this approach changed and clothing was acquired for other reasons, such as its fashionable cut and construction, provenance, rarity and the aesthetic appeal of the garment design. The collecting developed slowly and sporadically, chiefly through gifts, purchases or bequests of individual objects. Occasionally items came as part of collections of historical fashion, including accessories. These collections included 30 items of fashion and about 200 textiles from the Brooke Collection in 1864 and 1865, 124 fans from Sir Matthew and Lady Digby Wyatt in 1876, 31 items of dress and textiles from the Isham Collection in 1900, and 1442 items of dress from the Harrods collection in 1913. Items of contemporary fashion began arriving in the 1930s.

  By the second half of the 20^th century the discipline of dress studies was firmly established and in 1957 the first curator of fashion was appointed. Active collecting of 20^th-century fashion began in earnest in the 1960s. Several major holdings enhanced the collections: the Board of Trade Utility Collection of 34 items in 1942-3, the Heather Firbank Collection of 110 items of dress in 1960, the Cecil Beaton Collection of 12,000 items of dress in 1971, the Street Style collection from the exhibition of that name of 1,253 items of dress between 1993-1995, the Jill Rittblat Collection of 459 items of dress in 2000, the Costiff Collection of 178 full outfits by Vivienne Westwood in 2002, and, most recently, the Mark Reed collection of menswear of more than 50 complete ensembles, the Rayne Archive in 2017, and in 2018 30 items by Mary Quant.

  MUSEUM OF CHILDHOOD

  History of the Collection

  The Bethnal Green Branch of the South Kensington Museum opened to the public in June 1872. It was devised as an inspirational resource for local people, and to be an attractor to the neighbourhood for more affluent Londoners. For the first century of its existence, the Bethnal Green Museum (BGM) did not have a particularly clear sphere of activity. Its original exhibits were a collection of animal and food products, the former of which still composes a discrete part of MoC’s collection. In 1880, it received a large transfer of near-contemporary decorative art objects from South Kensington, however BGM did not retain its own collection at that time. In its first decades, the museum played host to a variety of others, such as the collections of Sir Richard Wallace and Augustus Pitt Rivers, and to what would later become the National Portrait Gallery, as well as objects relating to traditional East End trades such as shoe-making and silk weaving.

  A key figure in the history of collecting at BGM, and in the formation of its later identity, was Arthur Sabin. He had been appointed its curator in 1922 with a task to reorganise the museum, and was the first curator to collect objects specifically for BGM. He is remembered especially for his work with children, and his careful observations of how they used a museum. As well as collecting toys and other childhood-related objects, he hung paintings at a low height, created a formal education programme and established meaningful relationships with the local community. In the early years of the collection major donors included Mary Greg, an important collector of everyday domestic objects, Edward Lovett and Queen Mary.

  In 1974, Sir Roy Strong reimagined BGM as a museum of childhood, creating a home for the V&A’s collection of childhood objects. The small existing childhood collections were soon supplemented by major transfers of material from the V&A South Kensington’s collecting departments. The MoC’s collecting strategy has subsequently formed part of the overall policy of the V&A. Major collections acquired in this period have included a large and varied gift from the Palitoy Company (acquired in phases 1991-1999); Donne Buck’s archive of material relating to adventure playgrounds (acquired 2014-2017); and prototypes by Fredun Shapur (acquired 2015).

  In 2017, a major capital redevelopment of the MoC was announced to coincide with its 150^th anniversary in 2022. The emphasis of the museum is to change from a broad focus on the history and material culture of childhood, to a design-led museum for children, young people, and their carers. Its collecting strategy for the period 2019-2024 is formulated to reflect the new vision.

  Overview of the current collections

  The MoC, as a museum in its own right, has a collection that is varied, complex and broad. The collection can be viewed as being in two major parts: childhood objects acquired before 1974 transferred from the V&A’s other collecting departments; and objects collected directly by the MoC. Both parts are composed of broadly similar object types and materials, but with a far larger number of toys and games collected since 1974. Many areas crossover superficially with other V&A collections in terms of object types, such as furniture, photographs and ceramics, but with a specific concentration on children. A historic lack of clarity over MoC’s collecting remit has meant that acquisitions have not always been made strategically, and have tended to reflect a more social historical outlook than the applied arts, performance and design collections of the V&A. The collection is international in breadth but is best described as British-European in focus. The five main areas of collecting between 1974 and 2018 have been:

  • Children’s Clothing (daywear, nightwear, workwear, formal clothing, fancy dress and play)
  • Dolls’ Houses and Miniatures (including models)
  • Children’s Narratives (includes furniture, feeding equipment, child-made objects, learning and school-related objects, puppets, optical toys, video games)
  • Play (includes dolls, games and puzzles, learning and development, soft toys and toys)
  • Visual Representations of Childhood (includes art, paintings, photographs)
  • Archive (toy making, childhood papers)

  MoC’s singular strengths are its internationally important collections of dolls’ houses, children’s clothing and dolls. The sub-collection of fancy dress is uniquely rich and significant. The board games collection is very good, particularly strong for the 18^th and 19^th centuries, but with greater variation in quality in its 20^th century holdings. The children’s furniture collection is the best in the UK and consists of around 100 pieces and is especially strong in the 19^th century. Toys make-up a large portion of the collection, although the overall quality of the toy holdings is variable.

  Areas in which the MoC has aimed to collect, but in which it is currently less strong, include video games and digital objects, design relating to toys and schools, and contemporary material of all types. Design material is strong in specific areas – such as the Palitoy collection – but is not very well-represented across time periods and object types.

  Archival holdings

  The MoC archives relate to varied areas of interest including industrial history, with reference to British toy manufacturing, the social history of education and child development, theories of play and toy design. Most of the material is 20^th century. Important collections include the British Toymaking Archive (photographic material, trade catalogues, advertisements and promotional documents, press cuttings, financial records, company and personal correspondence and designs); the Faith Eaton archive (history of dolls and dolls’ houses); and the Donne Buck archive (play and playgrounds). The archive also contains historical records of the Museum of Childhood, including catalogues and other registers, photographic material, records of past exhibitions and displays and material relating to the history of the building.

  SCULPTURE, METALWORK, CERAMICS & GLASS

  Sculpture

  The Sculpture collection is the most comprehensive holding of post-classical European sculpture in the world, containing over 17,000 objects. Since it was formed within an applied art museum, the V&A’s collection is much broader than those found in many art galleries, where sculpture often simply forms an adjunct to a paintings collection. The collection contains outstanding and numerous examples of medieval ivories and English medieval alabasters, and celebrated collections of Italian Renaissance and Baroque sculpture; it also extends to polychrome wood sculpture and small-scale boxwood statuettes, terracotta sculptors’ models, bronze statuettes and functional pieces, including ivory plaques for the adornment of book covers. The chronological range of the collection is conditioned by the existence of the pre-eminent collections of classical sculpture at the British Museum and the holdings of post-1914 sculptures at Tate. With a small number of exceptions, therefore, the earliest pieces date from the beginnings of Christian art in around 300 AD and the latest to the early 20th century.

  The collection enjoys the status of a National Collection. Although certain categories of European postclassical sculpture are also to be found in the British Museum, the Wallace Collection and notable regional museums, nowhere else in the UK is the entire range of sculpture represented in such depth. The earliest acquisition dates from 1844. Major landmarks in the second half of the 19th century included the acquisition of the Gherardini Collection of sculptors’ models in 1854, sculpture from the Soulages Collection in 1856 and the Gigli-Campana Collection of Italian Sculpture in 1861. Numerous acquisitions made by J C Robinson in 1852-67 and the early 1880s created a collection of Italian sculpture that is unequalled outside Italy. The extensive collection of medieval ivories was established by the end of the 1860s through a series of purchases from the London dealer John Webb. The beginning of the 20th century was marked by gifts of Romanesque and Gothic sculpture from J H Fitzhenry between 1906 and 1910, and the Salting Bequest greatly strengthened the holding of bronzes and ivories in 1910. Rodin’s gift of 18 of his sculptures in 1914 instantly established the Museum as a place of study for the artist’s work. In 1916 the collection of architectural sculptures and plaster casts from the Royal Architectural Museum was transferred to the V&A. Dr W L Hildburgh was an outstanding benefactor to both the Sculpture and Metalwork collections: from 1915 until his death in 1955 he made numerous single gifts, but his greatest donation was his entire collection of over 260 English Medieval alabasters, given on his 70th birthday in 1946.

  We aim to acquire documented, signed and dated works of art that will enrich the most comprehensive holding of post-classical sculpture in the world. In recent years major acquisitions have included Lorenzo Bartolini’s Campbell Sisters (co-owned with the National Galleries of Scotland) and the Wolsey Angels. In addition, we have made strategic and serendipitous acquisitions of modern sculpture (such as Leon Underwood’s Gladiators), with an increasing interest in objects that hold relevance across the department (the ceramic Bust of Enoch Wood). In the next five years, we will continue to pursue such opportunities for enhancing our historic collections in British sculpture, alongside other regions of Europe that are less well represented, notably in the period post-1800. An agreement reached with Tate in 1983 stipulated that the V&A would not collect large-scale sculpture produced after 1914. In 2018 a second agreement was reached with Tate which opened up the possibility to expand our British and international holdings in sculpture for the first half of the 20^th century, especially in areas that fall within the V&A’s design and decorative art focus, including works on a larger scale. This area of development will be a focus going forward.

  Metalwork Section

  The Metalwork collection contains over 45,000 examples of decorative metalwork, silver and jewellery ranging in date from the Bronze Age to the present day. It includes an unrivalled collection of English silver, an outstandingly comprehensive collection of jewellery, and internationally significant collections of ironwork, continental silver, arms and armour, medieval champlevé and late 19th-century enamels, brass and bronze work, pewter, steel, cutlery, ormolu, Sheffield Plate, electrotypes and medieval metalwork of international importance. The pre-1800 German silver collection is the largest outside Germany and Russia. Long-term loans of British ecclesiastical silver have been encouraged since 1916 in order to illustrate this important aspect of the history of the craft.

  European silver, non-precious metals and decorated arms and armour were actively collected from the start, and outstanding purchases of both medieval and post-medieval objects were made at the sales of great collections, including those of Bernal, Soulages and Soltikoff (the Gloucester Candlestick and the Cologne Tabernacle). J C Robinson collected important examples of Spanish ecclesiastical silver in the second half of the 19th century and a rare group of medieval silver from the Basel Cathedral Treasury, sold by auction in 1836, was later bought by the Museum. The generosity of Dr W. L. Hildburgh in the 20^th century brought many pieces of European silver into the collection, including the Aldobrandini Tazza, a monstrance by Johannes Zeckl and many more examples of 16^th– century Spanish and Portuguese ecclesiastical plate. More recently, individual acquisitions of pre-eminence have included the Becket Casket (1997), a reliquary of St Sebastian (2001) and a Lille ewer and basin (2007).

  Much of the late 17th and 18thcentury British domestic silver and pewter entered the museum after 1900 as gifts and bequests from collectors; these include the Croft Lyons Collection of Sheffield Plate, pewter and boxes, the Cropper Collection of bottle tickets, and Late Stuart and Early Georgian silver from C D Rotch. In addition to its generous refurbishment of the Silver and Sacred Silver and Stained-Glass galleries, the Whiteley family has also played a major role in acquisitions of British silver over the last 25 years.

  The collections of jewellery and small work extend from tiaras to tie-pins, and gold watches to pomanders (ca. 14,000 items). Purchases in the 19th century included contemporary French jewellery bought in exhibitions in London and Paris, the Castellani Collection of Italian regional jewellery (1868) and the ring collection of the antiquary Edmund Waterton (1870). A superb collection of gemstones, including gems from the Hope Collection, was bequeathed in 1868 by the Reverend Chauncey Hare Townshend. Over 600 jewels were given by the scholar and collector Dame Joan Evans between 1933 and 1975. They date largely from before 1800, and complement the magnificent jewellery, mainly of the late 18th and 19th centuries, bequeathed by Lady Cory in 1951. Since the 1970s, 20th -century and contemporary jewellery has been at the centre of acquisition policy, building on the foundations laid by the Circulation Department. Two outstanding collections given by Patricia V. Goldstein in 2002 and Judith H. Siegel in 2007 to the American Friends of the V&A greatly increased both the quality and the extent of the display of 19^th– and 20^th– century European and American jewellery. The Royal College of Art Visiting Artists Collection, comprising work made between 1987 and 2006, was also acquired in 2007. As with the silver collections, continual encouragement of heirs to use the benefits of the Acceptance in Lieu system has resulted in major acquisitions, including two Cartier tiaras, work by C. R. Ashbee and Henry Wilson, and jewellery from the 1960s and 1970s. Since 2008 the William and Judith Bollinger Jewellery Gallery has provided an added stimulus to donors of both contemporary and historical work. Dr Genevieve Davies and William and Judith Bollinger funded the acquisition of a set of peridots given to Miss Cotes by the Prince Regent, and the Louise Klapisch collection of contemporary jewellery was donated by Suzanne Selvi in 2014. In 2016-17 Nicholas Snowman made a major Cultural Gift of work by Neuber and Fabergé. Queen Victoria’s sapphire and diamond coronet was presented in 2017 by the family of William and Judith Bollinger. In the same year Kashmira Bulsara announced the promised gift of 49 vanity cases from the first four decades of the 20^th century in memory of her brother, Freddie Mercury.

  Ceramics and Glass

  The Ceramics & Glass collection contains c. 80,000 objects, including ceramics and glass from the Western world, stained glass, post-medieval painted enamels on copper, and plastics. The holdings of European tin-glazed pottery and porcelain, English ceramics 1600-1900, post-medieval glass, tiles, stained glass and 20th-century and contemporary international ceramics and glass are of such size and importance as to be internationally pre-eminent. The Ceramics collection alone is without parallel; by virtue of its size, quality and range it may be considered pre-eminent in its entirety. The Glass collection, now largely housed in the Glass Gallery, is the most comprehensive in Europe, and the stained glass holdings are unparalleled anywhere in the world.

  From 1844, the earliest acquisitions focused on contemporary work and Renaissance wares with a ‘fine art’ emphasis. The French porcelain collections were strengthened by the Jones Bequest in 1882. The Schreiber Gift in 1884 laid the foundations for the outstanding collections of 18th-century English porcelain, bolstered by the transfer of objects from the Museum of Practical Geology in 1901. Maiolica and Renaissance and later painted Limoges enamels were strengthened by the Salting Bequest in 1910. The gift of the Wilfred Buckley Collection in 1936 transformed the holding of glass into one of leading international importance. The collections of stained glass, particularly of Medieval and Renaissance pieces, were augmented by the gifts and bequest (1900) of Henry Vaughan, followed by the Morgan Gift in 1919 and the gift of the Ashridge stained glass by E E Cook in 1928. Contemporary collecting by the former Circulation Department provided the foundations of today’s significant collection of 20^th–century ceramics and glass. Especially rich in Scandinavian ceramics and glass, and British and European studio ceramics, this has subsequently been developed and extended into the 21st century, and the section continues to have extremely strong holdings in contemporary work.

  The Glass collection has expanded considerably since the opening of the main Glass Gallery in 1994 and the Märit Rausing Gallery in 2004, with major additions of British and international glass art. The opening of a dedicated gallery for Contemporary Ceramics in 2009 has similarly provided an additional impetus for collecting, with an increased focus on international work and work of a sculptural nature.

  Collecting has focussed on ‘fine’ or artistic ceramics and glass, intended for display or domestic use, including decorated tiles. Sanitary ware, and ceramics and glass for industrial, medical, or other architectural uses are not normally acquired.

  THEATRE & PERFORMANCE DEPARTMENT

  Scope, history, standing and collecting

  The Theatre & Performance collections are the National Collection for the Performing Arts.

  Dedicated to the history, craft and practice of the live performing arts, with a focus on the UK, their emphasis is on drama, dance, opera, music and popular entertainment. In providing the national record of performance, they combine the functions of museum, archive, library and educational resource. Founded in 1924 by Gabrielle Enthoven, the collection constitutes one of the oldest and most significant in the world. Between 1974 and 2007 the department was referred to as the Theatre Museum. The current name was adopted when the Theatre Museum at Covent Garden closed.

  The department documents the production and critical reception of performance by gathering a variety of evidence in different media. To this day, the Collection still follows the structure of its founder Gabrielle Enthoven (1868 – 1950), a pioneer of contemporary collecting who employed a holistic approach. Objects are collected for their significance in the history, practice and development of performance.

  The collections fall into two main groups: Core Collections comprising the most popular and heavily used material, organised into large series according to format and material type (photographs, designs, prints, etc.), and Special Collections which are mainly archival.

  Acquisitions are made both through pro-active gathering of documentation on a systematic basis, the pursuit of target collections and items, and the creation of the department’s own record of contemporary performance through video and photography; and through re-active consideration of material offered as a gift, purchase or bequest.

  The department is widely regarded as leader of the many performing arts collections in the UK. It takes a central role in SIBMAS (the International Association of Performing Arts Museums and Libraries), the UK’s subject specialist network for the subject of performance – the Association of Performing Arts Collections (APAC), The Society for Theatre Research (STR), and the Theatre and Performance Research Association (TaPRA). It regularly engages in large-scale partnership projects with, and funded by, the HE sector, and other communities through HLF funding, focusing on research, digitisation, resource discovery, inspiration and creation of new works.

  The Theatre Museum was founded as a distinct department of the V&A in 1974 when the Enthoven and Beard collections were merged with the holdings of the British Theatre Museum Association and Richard Buckle’s ‘Friends of the Museum of Performing Arts’. The Theatre Museum’s role as the central performing arts holding was rapidly affirmed by the acquisition of the Antony Hippisley Coxe Circus Collection, and the British Puppet Guild Collection. Rock and pop was included in response to gifts from Pink Floyd, The Who, Elton John, and others, and the flourishing interest in popular music. The department is the deposit library on a de facto basis for professional performance in the UK and its collection of programmes is the most comprehensive in the world. No other institution documents UK performing arts from day to day or offers such depth of related material.

  In 1987 the Theatre Museum moved from South Kensington to separate premises in Covent Garden. Over 60,000 volumes were acquired on the closure of the British Theatre Association.

  Major archives including the Arts Council of Great Britain’s were added to the collection. Since 1992 the department has made archival recordings of selected, current productions for its National Video Archive of Performance (NVAP). Recorded performance has added a vital dimension to conventional collections by capturing performance in real time, and is heavily used for study, display and education. Our staff include a video producer and a contemporary performance curator.

  Despite the fact that the performing arts are global, collecting focuses on performance in the UK or where productions with a strong UK component have been staged around the world. It is also prioritised by subject area, strength of coverage and public demand. Where coverage is modest, a conscious decision is made either to improve the holdings, or to refer enquirers to other centres. Non-UK material may be collected where it is vital for a fuller understanding of the arts in this country. Similarly, although the collecting focus is on live performance, material relating to film, television, and radio is collected where artists, designers, writers and others have had active careers here, as well as in the theatre industry. We maintain a list of collections to be pursued which will assist the evaluation of offers of other material that the department may consider acquiring reactively. Amongst our priority areas, and with a focus on 20th and 21st-century collecting, we aim to develop the process of updating the national record of performing arts across the UK with programmes, posters, playtexts, library materials including commercial and archival recordings etc. Another area of focus is the recording of productions and interviews with key practitioners for the National Video Archive of Performance, where possible extending coverage beyond London to include other forms, especially popular entertainment. In 2016 the Department achieved the first Virtual Reality capture of a full production and continues to embrace technology in this field.

  We continue developing pro-active photography by using the department’s photographer to record current productions and by acquiring the work of outside photographers. We selectively build holdings of modern and contemporary designs, models, costumes, prompt-books and archives, whilst aiming to develop holdings on experimental theatre in the post-1968 era, theatre for young audiences, festivals, music and archives relating to queer, Black, Asian and other ethnic minority performance.

  The department continues to document rock and pop and its theatricality by collecting key examples of design and technology as well as photographs, archival material, etc. A further focus is the documenting of theatre architecture and stage technology through trade literature, photographs, plans, etc., to be regularly updated and relevant materials acquired and by maintaining close liaison with the Association of British Theatre Technicians, the Theatres Trust and English Heritage. We aim to develop acquisitions of library materials – new play texts and libretti professionally performed in the UK and key secondary materials including books, pamphlets, periodicals, trade catalogues, CD ROMs, commercial and archival videos, DVDs and other multimedia materials as appropriate. Collecting film which is integral or closely related to other material collected and where the conservation needs are manageable, and selectively acquiring digital material where it is fundamental to development of the subject area are further examples of our departmental targets. Finally, we wish to develop the collecting of individual records where the cover/other artwork is of design significance or collections which provide comprehensive coverage of relevant performance sectors.

  Drama/Theatre

  This area is the best represented of the performing arts in the collections. Coverage grows significantly from the 18th century onwards via playbills, programmes, posters, texts, reviews, files on practitioners, companies and theatres, books, letters, legal documents, prompt-books (e.g. for Look Back in Anger and The Mousetrap), photographic collections (e.g. Guy Little, Houston Rogers, Douglas Jeffrey, Ivan Kyncl), prints, drawings, ceramics and paintings. Costumes and accessories include examples worn by Olivier (e.g. as Richard III and Othello), Gielgud and Edith Evans, from Peter Brook’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and Inca masks from The Royal Hunt of the Sun. The design holdings, rivalled only by the Robert Tobin Collection (USA), include major work by de Loutherbourg, the Grieve family, Wilhelm, Gordon Craig, Ernst Stern, Tanya Moiseiwitsch, Maria Björnson, Leslie Hurry, Anthony Holland, Ralph Koltai, Sean Kenny, Michael Annals, Sally Jacobs, Voytek, Lez Brotherston, Mark Thompson and other leading names. The Museum is well provided with archives from theatres, companies and producers (e.g. H M Tennent, Royal Court, King’s Head, Tricycle, Almeida, Wilton’s Music Hall, Young Vic, Bernard Delfont Ltd, Unicorn and Cheek by Jowl), and actors including Paul Scofield, Ian McKellen, Vivien Leigh and Ellen Terry. Writers are well represented with the Christopher Fry personal archive covering a large span of the 20th century, alongside writers as diverse as Clemence Dane, Alfred Fagon, Tom Taylor and those produced by Paines Plough – a specialist new writing company whose archive is held by the department. Directors’ collections are also held by the Department, including those of Peter Brook and Yvonne Brewster. Drama has benefited from being a priority for NVAP recording and is another rich resource for documenting the work of leading contemporary actors, directors and designers. Coverage of Black and Asian work now includes NVAP videos of productions (e.g., Black Men Walking, Misty, East is East, Gem of the Ocean, Lift Off, the Not Black and White season of Black writing at the Tricycle), interviews with leading practitioners (Blackgrounds), archives (Black Mime Theatre, Temba Theatre, Talawa, biographical files, photographs and other material in the core collections.

  Dance

  Dance coverage is especially strong for ballet although the focus is now on broadening dance holdings. The heart of the dance collection is the extensive Ballets Russes holdings including the world’s largest collection of costumes and scenic cloths. A particular highlight is the Train Bleu front cloth (after Picasso). This is supported by the Parmenia Ekstrom Collection of Diaghilev’s business papers and drawings by Valentine Gross and British artists commissioned by Cyril Beaumont. Other significant pieces include those relating to Vaslav Nijinsky and Ram Gopal. The earliest items in the collection are designs for the 17th- century ballets de cour and the most recent is the 21st – century Akram Khan Archive. There are extensive collections of dance costumes, designs including those by Léon Bakst, Pavel Tchelitchev, Natalia Goncharova and Howard Hodgkin, and photographic collections including Gordon Anthony, Anthony Crickmay, Chris Ha and Chris Nash. The collection is notably strong on the 19th century including Romantic Ballet Prints, Margaret Rolf’s collection on Marie Taglioni and the Georges Jacobi Collection primarily of annotated music scores for the Alhambra Ballet. Developments in 20thcentury dance are well documented with archives and collections recording London Contemporary Dance Theatre, Western Ballet, Alexander Roy’s London Ballet as well as substantial holdings on major dance companies both through the core collections and named archives.

  Opera and Musical Theatre

  Opera material includes many libretti, programmes and prints of singers and composers; an original 1720 prompt copy for Handel’s Radamisto; costumes worn by Chaliapin, Tito Gobbi, Boris Kristoff and Joan Sutherland and in English National Opera and Royal Opera House Covent Garden productions; models and stage cloths by John Piper for Britten premieres; and the archives of Opera Factory, and of impresario Sander Gorlinsky. A recent substantial acquisition of paintings, ceramics and archival material was made from the Gasson Collection, further strengthening coverage of opera.

  Musical Theatre highlights include D’Oyly Carte’s Gilbert and Sullivan designs, Susan Hilferty’s Elphaba designs and costume for Wicked, prompt-books and photographs, the Salad Days magic piano, Julie Andrews’s My Fair Lady ball gown, the original conductor’s score for Jesus Christ Superstar and John

  Napier’s model for the 1996 Lyceum revival of that show, designs for The Phantom of the Opera and the Bunnett-Muir Musical Theatre Archive – one of the largest musical theatre collections in the world. Much documentation on musical theatre and opera is embedded in the core collections.

  Other performing arts

  Rock and Pop – includes Harry Hammond photographs of pop stars (late 1940s-60s), the photos of the Motown Review being recorded for Ready, Steady, Go! at Rediffusion’s studios in 1965, costumes worn by Mick Jagger, Adam Ant, Kiss, Shirley Bassey, Ella Fitzgerald, Tina Turner etc., Jamie Reid’s designs for The Sex Pistols, original artwork for the Rolling Stones’ lips logo and Lazaridis’ set model for Duran Duran’s 1993 tour.

  Circus – the UK’s best public holding. It comprises the collections of Antony Hippisley Coxe, Cyril Mills, Larry Turnbull posters and Baron de Rakoczy’s photographs of the 1920s-50s.

  Puppetry – includes rare Victorian Tiller-Clowes and Barnard marionettes, Handspring Puppet Company’s Joey made for the National Theatre production of War Horse, the Gair Wikinson marionettes, the British Puppet Guild Collection (mid-20th century) and extensive supporting documentation compiled by Gerald Morice. A recent acquisition is the archive of Punch & Judy material collected by the respected authority on English puppet theatre, George Speaight.

  Pantomime – includes early Grimaldi prints, scripts, gag books, designs by Hugh Durrant, Wilhelm, Comelli and others, a star trap, costumes for Victorian Harlequin, pantomime dame and cow, and a large collection of pantomime scripts produced for the Howard and Wyndham circuit between the 1940s and 1970s. Contemporary pantomime costumes include examples from Hackney Empire and Danny La Rue, as well as recordings of Ian McKellen in the Old Vic’s Aladdin and set designs and model pieces for the London Palladium.

  Revue, Cabaret – includes C B Cochran’s scrapbooks, the archives of Chauve Souris, André Charlot, Douglas Byng, the Windmill Theatre and designs by Oliver Messel and others, costumes for Murray’s and Eve’s cabaret clubs.

  Music Hall, Variety – includes many music sheets, images and business records for the Alhambra (Alfred Moul Collection) and the circuit managed by the London Pavilion Company.

  Theatre Buildings, Technology – includes a collection of ca. 10,000 building plans by Frank Matcham & Co., Colin Sorensen’s buildings files, Strand Electric’s photographs, Frederick Bentham’s (lighting control) Archive, and the Association of British Theatre Technicians’ interviews with practitioners.

  Film

  Although the V&A was a world museum pioneer in collecting photography from the 1850s, its attitude to collecting film in the early 20th century was not enthusiastic. Unlike early photography, considered by many to be an art form, film was seen at the time as a down market and sensational entertainment for the masses. These attitudes endured for many years and led eventually to the British Film Institute being founded in 1933. In recent years the Department’s interests have moved closer to those of the BFI, particularly on the design aspects of film. This resulted in the significant decision in 2012 for the BFI to transfer its costume collection to the V&A.

  Comedy

  Since 2010, Theatre & Performance has actively sought to develop its collections documenting key figures in British comedy. The department already owned the archive of the Windmill Theatre, where many key comedians such as Jimmy Edwards, Tony Hancock, Tommy Cooper and Peter Sellers began their stage careers. This has provided a rich foundation on which to build further holdings, including the Ronnie

  Barker Collection (acquired 2011) and Malcolm Chapman’s Tony Hancock and British Comedy Collection (acquired 2012) which covers Hancock as well as many other comedians of the twentieth century, including Max Miller, Beryl Reid, Hattie Jacques, Sid James and Peter Brough. Other collections of note include the Ken Dodd Archive, the Larry Grayson Collection, Roger Lloyd Pack Archive, June Whitfield Archive, Patricia Hayes Archive and costumes worn by Dame Edna Everage, Morecambe and Wise and Hattie Jacques. The department also holds a number of scripts for radio, television and film comedy, including those for Carry On films, episodes of Monty Python’s Flying Circus, Absolutely Fabulous, The Goon Show, The Vicar of Dibley and Benny Hill.

  WORD AND IMAGE DEPARTMENT

  Origins, scope and priorities

  The Word & Image Department (WID) was formed when the National Art Library (NAL) (including the Archive of Art and Design) together with the Museum Archives, and the Prints, Drawings, and Paintings Department were merged in 2001. The merged Department’s collections encompass a wide range of Museum objects and literature on all the subjects covered by the Museum’s collections: more than two million items overall. This plan concentrates on the collections as exemplars of art, craft and design. There is a separate Policy for the development of the NAL’s documentary materials available on the V&A website: (http://www.vam.ac.uk/content/articles/n/national-art-library-collection-developmentpolicydocumentary-materials/)

  The collections began with the Schools of Design set up at Somerset House in 1837 to help improve the teaching of design. They moved to Marlborough House in 1852 and in 1857 to the Museum at South Kensington. The title ‘National Art Library’ first appeared in 1865 at a time when the Universal catalogue of books on art was being planned. This catalogue was an early expression of the Library’s ambition to provide a national centre for art documentation. From the outset the NAL included prints and drawings, and by 1853, photographs. In 1909 prints and drawings were transferred to a new curatorial Department of Engraving, Illustration and Design. Photographs followed much later, in 1977, when the Department’s title became Prints, Drawings & Photographs. A separate Paintings Department was set up when the Museum opened at South Kensington in 1857. The Archive of Art and Design was established as part of the NAL in 1978 to assemble material already in the Museum, and to acquire archives associated with the production, marketing, promotion and study of British art and design.

  Collecting is carried out by six sections detailed below. British work is prioritised in all areas. The collections overlap with and complement many other collections nationally and internationally but are given distinctive meaning by their context. UK partnerships include the British Museum, the National Gallery, the National Portrait Gallery, Tate and the National Science and Media Museum with which the V&A has entered into loan arrangements to maximise the value of the collections to the nation, and the National Archives which, as well as overseeing the management of public records at the V&A, disseminates information on its collections via the National Register of Archives. We also work with numerous smaller bodies with complementary collections, and outreach organisations.

  The Department has responsibility for nine collections which have ‘individual national status’ (as defined by the provision of expertise and authoritative information, as well as the extent and/or significance of the collections themselves).

  These national collections in the care of the Word and Image Department are:

  • Architectural Drawings
  • Art of Photography
  • British Watercolours and Drawings
  • Commercial Graphics, including Posters
  • Computer Art
  • The National Art Library
  • Pastels
  • Portrait Miniatures
  • The work of John Constable (1776-1837)

  WID acquires historic material, especially in those areas where we have national responsibility, but in practice much of the Department’s collecting activity is now focused on the contemporary – that is, work by living artists and designers (often young or early in their careers), and with an emphasis on new media and technologies, new conceptual categories, and new object types, as well as topical material in traditional formats. The acquisition policy is essentially forward-looking, but also extends the strengths of the existing collections. The V&A’s aim is to promote, support and develop the UK creative economy by inspiring artists, designers and makers, and this is reflected in our collecting.

  Our commitment to the contemporary field necessitates a joined-up approach to identifying, assessing and taking decisions on acquisitions, given the spread of expertise on things contemporary within the Department, and also the ‘hybrid’ or mixed media character of so much contemporary work.

  This joined-up thinking extends to other Collections. We work closely with the Design, Architecture, and Digital Design section (DAD), especially in the field of architecture; and also with Asia curators who advise on and support relevant acquisitions of photography by the Word & Image Department. We collaborate with the Theatre & Performance Department, to coordinate our acquisition of design material, graphics and so on. The post-1900 Period Expertise Group is also a useful forum for developing a coordinated approach to collecting and for identifying those areas (such as digital art, product design, film) which the V&A aims to represent coherently.

  We collect to represent processes and techniques in all media. In terms of subject matter we seek to acquire work which reflects contemporary culture, including material which addresses political, cultural and social issues such as climate change, health and identity. By following the established patterns and purposes in collecting we are better able to collect effectively and systematically and also to co-ordinate our acquisition policy with the other national museums. At the same time, we are alert to new areas of art and design practice which may relate only tangentially to existing collection strengths, but are nevertheless pertinent to the V&A’s role and remit. We aim to continue building the collections in ways which reflect the cultural diversity of London and the UK.

  Collecting priorities are also linked to plans for new permanent galleries (and to the rotation of lightsensitive objects in such galleries) and to major exhibition projects, as well as departmental displays. It can be more cost-effective to acquire works for such projects than to borrow. Our current priorities in this area include finding works in all media for major forthcoming exhibitions. Collecting priorities can be summarised in several broad categories, but within each of those categories there are more specific priorities which may be object types, work by individual named artists, or work from particular groups or geographic areas. Priorities for each curatorial section are given below.

  The Archive of Art and Design (AAD)

  The collection of some 350 archives aims to represent the design process from conception to consumption and provides a preeminent point of access to primary source material for the study of applied art and design. It includes records of individual artists and designers, businesses and institutions involved in the production, marketing, promotion and study of art and design, including order books, correspondence, accounts, diaries, photographs, and promotional material. Architects’ archives are, where appropriate, directed to the RIBA and fine arts archives to Tate; in other areas the V&A is as anxious to ensure that archives find an appropriate home as to add them to the V&A’s collection.

  Priorities for the AAD are shaped by two factors, the first being a moral obligation to accept accruals to our existing archival collections to prevent archives being dispersed unnecessarily, and the second being limited storage space. Our practice is to consider high-quality material only, by which we mean that it is from a significant name; or that it documents a career or business concisely; material which represents the design process clearly; or where there will be strong research interest. Our other priorities are archives which fill a gap in our holdings (examples include ceramics design, or male fashion), or which supplement our strongest existing holdings (e.g. stained glass, silver). Archives with strong links to a particular locality are directed to a local authority repository; we always seek a suitable alternative home for an archive before we decide to acquire it for the V&A.

  Designs

  The designs collection of over 80,000 drawing is stored and made accessible by WID with the curator matrix-managed between DADD and WID. The collection has some international rivals for major historical material, but no national rivals except in terms of architectural drawings, where the holdings complement those of the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA). The British Museum has occasionally acquired design drawings, as works of art, rather than as examples of a design process.

  The V&A has a remit to lead public perception and understanding of design as a category and as a process, and this must be reflected in our collecting policy. In the field of design drawings, we continue to collect contemporary examples in those areas in which we already have strong holdings and which relate directly to the other V&A collections – furniture, textiles, ceramics, and metalwork. We also collect drawings for architecture, sculpture, the applied and industrial arts, product design, fashion. Areas of design activity which fall outside these traditional categories are now being targeted: product design, fashion design and illustration, garden design, designs relating to shops and shopping, and graphic design (complementing existing strengths in the print collections).

  Though much of the design material we collect relates to the domestic milieu, we also aim to collect designs for public projects, such as monuments and sculpture. Wherever possible we aim to acquire the complete ‘job bag’ (everything from first concept to specification). We want to reflect the importance of Computer Aided Design in the design industry. 3D models are collected where they play a significant part in demonstrating or elucidating the design process.

  A cross-Museum approach is being taken to collecting architecture, led by DAD. Architects’ drawings are collected with a focus on global architecture; the RIBA collects the work of British architects only. The V&A’s purpose in collecting is to represent the art of architecture, architecture in relation to the other design disciplines, and the connection between architectural design and society; the RIBA collects material in order to represent the processes of architecture. Since 2004 the RIBA collection has been housed at the V&A. The RIBA collection is very large (ca. 1,000,000 items) and is the property of its membership. WID’s collection differs from the RIBA in that it includes designs for building by type, as well as by architect.

  We do not proactively acquire design for film, which is the province primarily of the British Film Institute. However, where a designer’s career includes film among other design disciplines, or where specific works clearly relate to existing strands of V&A collecting and offer new perspectives on other design disciplines such as architecture, interiors, furniture, graphics and fashion, design for film is considered for the V&A’s collection.

  Paintings

  The collection contains over 2000 oil paintings, of which around one third are Continental and two thirds are British; over 2000 portrait miniatures; over 7000 watercolours; over 10,000 British drawings, illustrations and sketchbooks; and over 4000 continental drawings including Old Masters, watercolours, illustrations and sketchbooks.

  The collection began in 1843 with the purchase of copies of decoration by Raphael. It expanded in 1857 with John Sheepshanks’ gift of 233 oil paintings and 289 watercolours, drawings and etchings by mainly contemporary British artists, which was known for 50 years as the National Gallery of British Art. Since the foundation of Tate in 1897, most collecting of oils has been of decorative paintings, works related to decorative schemes, representations of design and the decorative arts (including buildings and landscape gardens), and portraits of practitioners of art and design. The collection of 19^thcentury British oil paintings, which includes the principal collection of John Constable, is, nonetheless, second only to that of Tate. The foreign oil paintings are also of national significance.

  We continue to have national responsibility for collecting British watercolours and also British portrait miniatures, an unrivalled collection, with foreign examples acquired to provide a wider context. In addition, it is agreed with the British Museum, the National Gallery, the National Portrait Gallery and Tate that we should have national responsibility for pastels. We also collect drawings and have strength in Italian, Netherlandish and French as well as British examples, and such amateur media as silhouettes and cut-paper work. The collection is outstanding for the range of painting media represented, from late antiquity to the present.

  In collecting unique works on paper, we continue the established pattern of acquisition, concentrating on the work of British artists, and artists working in Britain, including recent immigrants and artists from the African and Asian diaspora. We continue to focus on the innovative use of traditional media, and on the processes and techniques of artistic production. Drawings by sculptors and installation artists are particularly desirable. With three recognised ‘national’ collections (portrait miniatures; British watercolours; pastels) we continue to give priority to significant acquisitions in these areas.

  Photographs

  The V&A holds one of the world’s largest and most important collections of photography. The collection is international and spans the whole history of the subject from before it was officially announced to the public in 1839 to the present. It numbers about 800,000 photographs and is designated the National Collection of the Art of Photography. The collection is extremely broad, covering the cultures of photography from its use as a fine art to science, photojournalism, fashion, and many other applications.

  The V&A was the first museum in the UK to collect photographs, beginning in 1852, and the first to hold a photography exhibition, in 1858. Throughout the 19^th century, as well as building an extensive ‘virtual museum’ of reproductive photographs illustrating art, architecture and design, acquisitions were also made directly from major creative photographers and photography was recognized by the museum as a creative art in its own right. In 1977, much of the photographic collection transferred from the NAL to the re-named Prints, Drawings, Paintings & Photographs Department. Holdings of 19^{th –} and more especially 20^th – century classic photographs have since expanded rapidly, and the collection of contemporary photographs has become a priority.

  In 2017, the Royal Photographic Society (RPS) Collection was transferred to the V&A from the Science Museum Group. It comprises approximately 270,000 photographs, 6,000 cameras and pieces of related equipment, and 26,000 volumes of photographic books and periodicals, as well as an archive of important letters. The arrival of this major collection was the impetus for creating the Photography Centre, Phase 1 of which opened in October 2018, more than doubling the space dedicated to photography. Phase 2 will double the space again, to a total of approximately 1030 square metres (11,000 square feet), and is scheduled for completion in 2022. Although cameras and related equipment from the RPS Collection are exhibited in the Photography Centre, we do not continue to collect such material. The Centre includes a Project Space for newly commissioned work and a Light Wall of screens for displaying born-digital photography. Our policies for commissioning and collecting born-digital or screen-based photography are being developed with DADD.

  The history of photography has traditionally been centred on Western Europe and the United States, and we will always seek to improve our holdings of such classic photographs. In the past decade we have prioritised collecting work from the Middle East, Africa and African diaspora, Eastern Europe, and Asia. We remain keen to diversify our holdings to reflect a broad range of important cultural and political issues. We continue to focus on work by emerging photographers, especially those trained or working in Britain. Other priorities include contemporary fashion photography, photojournalism, vintage mid-20^th century photographs and items that exemplify a range of processes and techniques. Photo books and books made by artists using photography continue to be an area of interest, and these are collected by the National Art Library in consultation with Photographs curators.

  A Photographs Acquisition Group (PAG) was established in 2011 to help the Museum expand and diversify its renowned collection, and keep it up to date. PAG brings enthusiasts and collectors with a shared passion for photography into closer dialogue with the Museum’s curators. Donations from the group help the Museum plan for and continue to broaden its holdings, purchase historic and contemporary work, support emerging photographers and commission new work from contemporary practitioners. We are also founding members of the UK Photographic Collections Network (PCN), a Subject Specialist Network supported by the Arts Council and Art Fund. The PCN devises and hosts training and networking events for members, provides advice for institutions, collectors and practitioners taking care of photographic collections. It aspires in future to establish an online catalogue of UK public photography collections.

  Overall, the focus of the section’s collecting is to facilitate changing displays, research and publications and to connect with other areas of the V&A’s collections. The Collecting Strategy is designed to tell a balanced chronological history of photography in the Museum’s annual changing displays, to contribute photographs to the Museum’s periods and styles galleries and to contribute to the headline temporary exhibition programme.

  Prints

  This section is responsible for collecting printed images created as works of art or to fulfil a practical purpose. The Print collection had its origins in the teaching collections of the Government School of Design. From 1909 prints were part of Engraving, Illustration and Design and its successor departments.

  The Prints collection comprises ca. 500,000 items, including fine art prints from the Renaissance to the present; printed designs for the decorative arts; portraits; topography; social history subjects, religious and pagan symbolism; costume and fashion plates; fan leaves; caricatures; playing cards, packaging, stationery, posters and other commercial graphics; wallpapers; and reproductive prints.

  Uniquely in Britain, the Prints collection embraces ‘fine’ prints and commercial production. It also houses the most comprehensive collection of printed designs for the decorative arts in the UK, one of the world’s foremost collections, and is the only museum collection that aims to represent the history of how prints have been presented and displayed. It does not seek to rival the British Museum’s collection of Old Master prints, although acquisitions in this field are made to improve representation of printmaking techniques, where we aim to be comprehensive, and where specific works are needed for gallery projects and touring exhibitions. The V&A is the only national institution to have consistently collected prints by living artists since the mid-19^th century.

  The V&A is the only UK museum to collect across the whole spectrum of ‘print’ from ephemera to fine art. Many of our priority areas for collecting extend or build on established strengths (wallpapers, greetings cards, fine art prints) but focus on manifestations which employ new media or have new applications. For example, it is a continuing priority to acquire wallpapers designed by artists and made specifically for installations and exhibitions; our greetings card acquisitions now include examples for the holidays and festivals of various cultures, and cards promoting companies and institutions. The V&A does not collect postcards. In the field of fine-art prints, we are especially interested in examples which employ digital or other new or unconventional media, and the application of print to 3D formats, including unique works as well as multiples. Within fine art printmaking, other key priorities include work by artists from Africa and the African diaspora, and from Russia and Latin America.

  Of our traditional collecting strengths, posters (commercial and political) remain a high priority.

  Significant gaps in our holdings include work from the Polish Poster School (1950s – 1980s) as our current holdings are not representative of this important area; International Typographic School (largely Swiss in origin); ‘new wave’ graphic design of the 1980s; Chicano posters, which are largely missing from our otherwise good holdings of 1960s and 70s agit-prop posters. We also wish to acquire more material relating to the design process for posters, since our current holdings of original poster artwork mainly relate to pre-war London Transport posters. As with the other sections (Designs, Digital Art) we also want to find ways to ‘collect’ or archive posters and other graphics which exist only in a digital form. Strategies for collecting contemporary material include visiting international poster biennales, working with the Design and Art Direction awards to get copies of the best of the nominated posters, and liaising with commissioning organizations such as Transport for London’s Art on the Underground. We are alert to current events which generate posters, such as the Olympic Games, and UK and US elections, as well as activism and protest world-wide.

  In keeping with the Museum’s founding emphasis on design and making, we are keen to acquire material relating to the processes of printmaking, such as blocks, plates and proofs (with published impressions, if we do not already hold them), subject to the usual criteria with regard to the quality of the work. We also continue to collect printed designs for the decorative arts; likewise, trade cards relating to products in the V&A collections – particularly textiles and dress, furniture and interiors, metalwork, jewellery, ceramics and glass, as well as the printing trade.

  The Art and Design of the Book

  The National Art Library collects examples of the arts and design of text and image, and the formats in which ideas and illustrations are published, ranging from medieval manuscripts to modern paperbacks.

  Its national status relates to the scale and specialism of the library as a whole, but several individual aspects of the collection are of national significance: medieval, Renaissance and modern illuminated manuscripts, modern calligraphy (representative for the post Edward Johnston revival period, British and foreign), book bindings, artists’ books, comics and graphic novels. The Renier Collection of 80,000 children’s book is the largest in the country (new acquisitions of children’s books are infrequent). The NAL does not in general collect original artwork and designs, but alongside the AAD it holds the largest collection anywhere of Beatrix Potter’s art, manuscripts and related material, and occasionally makes additions. Collecting is done with reference to major national collections such as the British Library, Tate and other specialist organizations. As for WID at large, the main emphasis is on current production rather than antiquarian items.

  Western medieval and post-medieval illuminated manuscripts were acquired from the 1850s onwards, as complete volumes but also as cuttings (over 2,000 pieces). Although the primary reason for their acquisition was so that they could serve as a design source for artists and craftsmen, some were collected for their outstanding quality or as fine examples of the work of celebrated illuminators. The NAL is noteworthy for documenting the persistence of illumination into the modern era and its manifestations in print, and seeks opportunities to continue strengthening this area. Examples of early printing were collected in a similar way, in the form of complete works as well as single pages or cuttings. This aimed to provide an encyclopedic account of book design and ornament. The cuttings are now for the most part held in PDP collections while complete volumes are in the NAL. The collection of fine bindings similarly aims to provide an overview from the middle ages to the present, with an emphasis on European examples: this we aspire to enhance through commissions if possible. The Clements Collection is outstanding for historical armorial bindings from the British Isles. Holdings of illustrated books in trade and deluxe bindings are also extensive. The collection is strong in publications of selected private presses, writing and lettering books, fine typography, and livres d’artistes. With the traditional crafts and technologies of the book thus well represented, additional examples are acquired today only if they are particularly relevant to the collection or to contemporary conditions of book production.

  The 20th-century Book Art collection was built up during the 1980s and 1990s to become the foremost in Britain. In this period book art became established as an art practice in its own right. Today artists’ books of all kinds are acquired, albeit very selectively. We collect to represent the response and impact of significant artists when they address the concepts and formats of the book. We also continue to document the ongoing development of book art as an art practice, especially work responding to changes in the contemporary scenes of publishing and the distribution of ideas. Since 2014 the predominant focus of collecting has been on photo books, primarily those published by small independent presses or by artists themselves, in a vibrant culture specific to the very recent past and present. Digital works were first acquired in the 1990s, in physical formats now becoming obsolete; in future we may address digital artists’ publications in liaison with DADD, if a sustainable infrastructure for storage and access is established. Acquisitions are naturally linked where possible to museum programmes or existing holdings in the NAL and in other departments. With the bulk of British artists’ books collected at the British Library through active curation as well as legal deposit, we focus more on Europe and the U.S., aiming to complement rather than duplicate other collections.

  Since the 1980s, the National Art Library has built up its comics holdings very substantially, on the basis of several large private collections. The main strength is American, including separate collections of Romance and Disney -based comics; balanced by a collection of amateur British ‘mini-comics’. In collecting comics, the aim is to provide a study collection representative of all formats, of major centres of production, and of innovative design and art-work. Individual items are added if they are newsworthy, or if they evoke an important aspect of contemporary life or are inspired by artistic and design subjects.

  Museum collections have represented commercial design from the outset. The Jobbing Printing collection of commercial graphics, 1936, is a noteworthy example, but The Library collected examples of modern book design from the 1860s. Innovative commercial book production of the 20^th century in the form of paperbacks, dust jackets, and children’s books was also added to the collection. A small collection of annually ‘trawled’ items documents ‘High Street’ book and magazine design in the early 21^st century. Today, examples are collected only very selectively, on grounds of excellence or influence, and ‘the everyday book as a designed object’ is currently beyond the NAL’s collecting scope, not least because of space constraints. Acknowledging this, the British Library loan deposit of 500,000 20 ^th -century dust jackets was returned to the BL in 2016. In 2016 the Library welcomed the Jacqueline and Jonathan Gestetner Collection, the world’s largest and most comprehensive collection of paper peepshows, allocated through the Cultural Gifts Scheme. Primarily dating from the 19th century, earlier and later examples are included.

  The name ‘Word and Image’ leads to expectations of an illustration specialism. The NAL has extensive holdings of illustrated books, on such subjects as natural history and botany, topography, costume and all the decorative arts, as well as literary and imaginative works. These reflect both the needs of early student designers and artists for visual information about the world, and the fact that illustration provided a career for artists, especially once 19th-century technological and educational developments created a large market for illustrated magazines. After 1909 the Department of Engraving, Illustration and Design actively pursued illustration of all kinds in original artwork and separate prints. Related books often were held in the Library, and illustrated bookplates and dust jackets were collected by both departments. The Archive of Art & Design has acquired a number of illustrators’ archives. Thus, research material relevant to illustration is distributed broadly across the Word & Image Department. In 2018, the remit of the Frederick Warne Curator was reconceived to focus on illustration, and coordinate acquisitions of illustration artwork where appropriate. The contemporary illustration industry is supported primarily through the annual V&A Illustration Awards rather than collecting. Museological and art-historical illustration, both graphic and photographic, are of course copiously represented in the Library’s extensive documentary holdings.

  Digital Art

  Until the early 2000s, the Museum held relatively few works that illustrate the early years of computergenerated art and design. However, the Department now holds one of the world’s largest collections of computer art, created from the late 1950s onwards. For the purposes of this plan, the term ‘computer art’ is used for works created before the advent of personal computers, or in a similar style if created later.

  Various other terms are used to describe specific categories or genres, but we use the broader term Digital Art to characterise the collection as a whole. In practice, computer-aided design and computer graphics were closely related to computer art in the early years of the new medium. Prints of computergenerated images began to enter the Department’s collection as early as 1969, soon after the groundbreaking Cybernetic Serendipity exhibition held at London’s Institute of Contemporary Arts. A few other computer-generated works were acquired from time to time, but the strength of the collection today is the result of two major acquisitions: the Patric Prince Collection and the archives of the Computer Arts Society. The V&A now holds an internationally significant collection of computer art from the 1960s to the 1990s and beyond. Together, these major acquisitions form the basis for the V&A’s national collection of computer-generated art.

  The bulk of the artworks in the Patric Prince Collection and Computer Arts Society Collection consist of plotter drawings, screen prints, inkjet prints, posters and photographs, but there are also examples in other media, including 3D images and computer files. Patric Prince was an art historian and archivist of computer art. Based in California, she actively collected computer-assisted art works for many years. In addition to some 200 individual artworks, the collection also contains books, archival material and ephemera, including monographs, manuals, exhibition catalogues, slides, off-prints and interviews with practising artists. Because the early history of digital culture is still under-documented, the material she accumulated is now of great significance to researchers.

  The Museum also holds the archives of the Computer Arts Society (CAS), including some 200 artworks. As computer artists passed through London, they often gave the Society examples of their work. These were stored until the V&A acquired the collection in 2007, along with the Society’s working records of its own activities. The CAS material complements the Patric Prince collection perfectly. So-called ‘algorithmic’ works are particularly well represented, and the Department now holds significant pieces by major figures such as A. Michael Noll, Georg Nees, Frieder Nake, Vera Molnar, Manfred Mohr, Harold Cohen, Paul Brown, Roman Verostko, Jean-Pierre Hebert and Mark Wilson. We continue to build on these core collections, and have also acquired additional computer-generated works on paper by artists such as Frederick Hammersley, Darrell Viner, and Colette and Jeff Bangert. We also seek to expand our holdings in some under-represented areas, such as South American computer art.

  We also collect recent born-digital artworks selectively, by artists such as Daniel Brown, Aaron Koblin, Casey Reas and Andy Lomas. The technological and logistical problems of preservation and display lead us to focus on works that require little or no active maintenance. Where necessary, we do also acquire digital artworks that depend on specific hardware or software, but we remain conscious of the long-term consequences of doing this. Priority is given to digital works, or applications of digital technology, which complement or extend our holdings in other media (e.g. computer art on paper, the book, wallpaper, etc.). The V&A’s Design, Architecture and Digital Design Department Is now responsible for contemporary collecting in areas that relate to designed objects, such as information design, videogames and the use of digital technologies in product design, architecture and other disciplines.

  Source: Collection development policy

  Date: 2019

  Licence: CC BY-NC