The Herbert Art Gallery and Museum in Coventry was reopened following extensive reconstruction on 29th October 2008, as the city's main art gallery, museum, history and media centre. The museum was originally constructed from donations by Sir Alfred Herbert and was first opened in 1960 by my grandmother, Lady Nina Herbert. My brother Piers and I were invited to the reopening as descendants of the Herberts (details of which can be found in Herry's Archive).
There are now eight permanent galleries for its own collections together with a new history centre, housing archives documenting the life of the city through almost 800 years of its existence. There are also five temporary exhibition spaces and another five visitor galleries in which they show work across the arts and from some of the great museums and galleries in the country. Gallery 1 currently has an exhibition of photographs from the V&A, the while Gallery 4 contains an exhibition of the unusual work of Ana-Maria Pacheco. Added to which, no less than three 'George Eliots’ circle the galleries declaiming lines from her writings and bringing a touch of amusing realism to everyday Coventry.
The Herbert must now be one of the finest city museums and art galleries in Britain - and the cafe is excellent too!
Click the heading for some photos of the Herbert
