A kiss, a queen and a battered Venus: the Art Fund celebrates 120 years of saving art
about 6 months ago (11/08/2023)
A kiss, a queen and a battered Venus: the Art Fund celebrates 120 years of saving art | Art and design | The Guardian Skip to main content A kiss, a queen and a battered Venus: the Art Fund celebrates 120 years of saving art The largest grant in its history to date, £2.5m, went to help save Joshua Reynolds’ Portrait of Mai (Omai) earlier this year Photograph: David Parry. Courtesy of National Portrait Gallery One of the treasures of London’s National Gallery was in the news earlier this week when Just Stop Oil protesters smashed the glass protecting Diego Velázquez’s Rokeby Venus. More than a century earlier the same painting was attacked with a meat cleaver by suffragette Mary Richardson Photograph: Antonio Olmos/The Observer Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Velázquez’s Rokeby Venus was acquired for the nation in 1906, the first campaigning triumph of the newly formed Art Fund, established in 1903 prompted by the government’s inadequate museum funding.