How often my soul visits the National Gallery, and how seldom
I like all sorts of art, that's why I love wandering around The National Gallery.
I have no favorite museum, but it could be the National Gallery in London; it could be the Palais de Tokyo in Paris. Every city has a great museum.
At one point Trudeau mentioned to me that the National Gallery wanted to buy a masterpiece by the great Italian painter Lotto, and it needed a million dollars from the Treasury Board. "Is that Lotto-Quebec or Lotto-Canada?" I joked, but I got the message, and the National Gallery got the painting.
The Washingtonian said it shouldn't be built. The gallery's East Building is now considered a triumph, and members of the American Association of Architects have voted it one of the best buildings of all time.
It was my father's hope, and it is ours, that the National Gallery would become not a static but a living institution, growing in usefulness and importance to artists, scholars and the general public.
When I was eight or nine, I came to London for the day from Swindon and went to The National Gallery. I remember standing in Trafalgar Square with my best friend Tim, who was covered in pigeons because I put bird seed on his head.
It shouldn't be that people think the National Gallery is just for middle-class white people.
Which painting in the National Gallery would I save if there was a fire? The one nearest the door of course.
I find old copies of National Gallery catalogues, which are written in the dryest possible prose, infinitely soothing.
