Masterpieces from Buckingham Palace: The Queen's Gallery, Buckingham Palace

This exhibition is in the past. View our current exhibitions.

Masterpiece a minute

      Most of the paintings in our forthcoming exhibition, Masterpieces from Buckingham Palace, are securely dated and attributed; mostly we know which monarch bought them. But what makes them important? What do they still have to offer? Desmond Shawe-Taylor, Surveyor of The Queen’s Pictures, discusses four possible qualities which were valued by the makers of these works and which can still offer an insight into these paintings today: Realism; Use of Materials; Design; Expression. Are we missing something? What do you think makes a masterpiece?

      Royal Collection staff discuss their favourite Masterpieces

      Explore the exquisite details and hidden stories below.

      de Hooch's 'Cardplayers in a sunlit Room'

      Rembrandt's 'Agatha Bas'

      Canaletto's 'The Bacino di San Marco on Ascension Day'

      Parmigianino's 'Pallas Athene'

      Vermeer's 'Lady at the Virginals with a Gentleman, "The Music Lesson"'

      Ruisdael's 'Evening Landscape: A Windmill by a Stream'

      de Hooch's 'Cardplayers in a sunlit Room'

      Rembrandt's 'The Shipbuilder and his Wife'

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      Royal Collection Trust is a charity caring for the Royal Collection, one of the world’s great art collections. Income from your visit helps us to conserve and share the Collection so that it can be enjoyed by everyone, wherever they are.