The National Gallery is extending its opening hours after huge public demand in the first two weeks.
The gallery's reopening has been so popular that, as of July 22, visitors will have two extra hours to enjoy its world-class collection, including the acclaimed exhibition Titian: Love, Desire, Death.
It reopened to the public last Wednesday after 111 days closed due to the coronavirus pandemic, with people queuing up around the building to enter.
Under new measures, visitors follow one-way art routes around the venue and all visits, including those to see the main collection for free, must be booked in advance. Two-metre social distancing rules are in place throughout and face coverings are strongly encouraged.
More tickets are being released for the Titian exhibition, which is now extended to January 2021. The Standard’s five star review praised the old master’s “paintings of glorious fleshiness, glowing colour and overt eroticism”.
The gallery’s director Gabriele Finaldi said: “We wanted to use these early weeks of reopening to make sure we were offering the very best visitor experience in the very safest way, before increasing the number of visitors we can let in. Having successfully reopened and with huge demand from the public for our once in a lifetime Titian exhibition, we are delighted to now extend our opening hours by a further two hours daily.”
The new dates for the highly anticipated Artemisia Gentileschi exhibition were also announced this week, with the addition that the unseen court transcript from the 1612 trial, where artist Agostino Tassi was charged with “deflowering” Gentileschi, will be on show to the public for the first time.
The National Gallery will be open until 6pm daily from July 22.
