Tate galleries are four important art museums in England. Tate Modern and Tate Britain are in London. The other two museums are Tate Liverpool and Tate St. Ives.
Tate Britain
exhibits the greatest collection of British art in the world. The collection covers the period from 1500 to the present and includes works by such artists as William Blake, John Constable, Thomas Gainsborough, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, and J. M. W. Turner.
Tate Britain is housed in the Tate Gallery, a museum founded in 1897 by Sir Henry Tate, an English art patron and philanthropist. Tate led the campaign to create a museum devoted to British art by donating the building along with his personal collection of British art. The museum was originally called the National Gallery of British Art but was renamed in Tate’s honor. The gallery reopened in 2000 as Tate Britain.
Tate Modern
is devoted to international art created from 1900 to the present. The museum opened in 2000 in the former Bankside Power Station overlooking the River Thames in central London. The power station was designed in 1947 by Sir Giles Gilbert Scott, a noted British architect of public buildings. The structure has been remodeled by the Swiss architects Jacques Herzog and Pierre de Meuron, retaining much of its original appearance. The architects also designed a 10-story addition called the Switch House, which opened in 2016.
Tate Liverpool
is the home of the National Collection of Modern Art in the North of England. The gallery ranks as the largest British museum outside of London devoted to modern and contemporary art. The gallery is housed in a converted warehouse that is part of the historic Albert Dock, which overlooks the River Mersey. Tate Liverpool opened in 1988.
Tate St. Ives
is in the unitary authority of Cornwall. The gallery bases its exhibitions on art from the permanent Tate collection, known as the British National Collection of Modern Art, and a series of exhibitions of contemporary art and works by artists of today. The gallery stands on a site that has impressive views of the Cornish coast. The gallery opened in 1993.
Tate St. Ives also operates the Barbara Hepworth Museum and Sculpture Garden a short distance from the gallery. The museum is in the former studio used by Hepworth, a noted British sculptor who died there in a fire in 1975.
