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Glasgow Museums Resource Centre Specialist Tours

Throughout the year Glasgow Museums Resource Centre holds Specialist Tours where you can join the curators for an in depth look at the collections!

Glasgow Museums Resource Centre Specialist Tours

About Glasgow Museums Resource Centre Specialist Tours

21st January 2025
4th February 2025
18th February 2025
plus 12 more date(s), see below for more info
2.30pm - 3.30pm
Glasgow Museums Resource Centre
200 Woodhead Road, Glasgow South Side G53 7NN
Free but booking required
Event organiser/part of Glasgow Museums
Visit the event website here

Tuesday 21st Jaunary: Ship Models in Detail
Join this tour of the Ship Model store to see Clyde shipbuilding in miniature with a detailed look at liners, paddle steamers and battleships. Find out more about how ship models were made and used.

Tuesday 4th February: Arms and Armour
Join Curator of Arms and Armour Ralph Moffat for this free tour.

Tuesday 18th February: Highlights of the Italian painting collection
Glasgow Museums is home to an internationally-important collection of Italian paintings. Join Curator of European Art, Pippa Stephenson, to explore a selection of these artworks.

Tuesday 4th March: An Hour with the Four
This always popular tour offers a chance to look in detail at works by 'The Four': Charles Rennie Mackintosh, Margaret Macdonald, Frances Macdonald and James Herbert McNair. From early collaborative graphic works to exquisite watercolours, furniture design and interior decoration this tour led by Alison Brown, Curator for European Decorative Art and Design 1800-present, gives an insight into the history, making and symbolism of their work and of some of their contemporaries. Early booking is advised.

Tuesday 18th March: Commemorating King James VI and I on the 400th year since his passing
This tour celebrates King James VI and I (1566-1625) marking the 400th year since his passing through a portrait of him dated 1618. It begun a sequence of royal portraits in the city's collection which also hails Glasgow 850.

Tuesday 1st April: The Caledonian Railway - Exploring the history of one of Scotland's great railway companies
The Caledonian Railway, or ‘Caley’, was one of Scotland’s Big Five railway companies. It’s lines stretched north from Carlilse to Glasgow and Edinburgh, crossing the Central Belt and thru the West Highlands to Oban. On this tour you can discover the history of railway, learn about its distinctive company livery and find hidden gems from our collection taken from Bridge Street Station and St Rollox Works.

Tuesday 6th May: Spanish Paintings from Pollok House
Sir William Stirling Maxwell was a pioneering Scottish collector of Spanish paintings. While Pollok House is closed for renovations, these important paintings are housed at GMRC. Take this opportunity for an up-close exploration of a selection of these fascinating paintings, accompanied by Curator of European Art, Pippa Stephenson-Sit.

Tuesday 20th May: Glasgow Women Artists
Join Curator of British Art Jo Meacock as she explores the lives and artworks of Glasgow women artists in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Artists who studied at Glasgow School of Art, were members of the pioneering Glasgow Society of Lady Artists and independent New Art Club, who fought for female suffrage, for recognition in male-dominated institutions, were forced to give up teaching because of the Marriage Bar and who faced all kinds of challenges as they sought to juggle motherhood, domestic life and professional careers, and attain equality with their male peers. The tour will include artists such as Norah Neilson Gray, Bessie MacNicol, Chris Fergusson, Mary Armour, Millie Frood and Louise Annand.

Tuesday 3rd June: "Doon the Watter" with models of Clyde Paddle Steamers
Join this tour of the Ship Model store to look at models of Clyde steamers from the 1840s to the 1920s. From simple early half hulls to complex display models with full internal detailing this tour looks at the fascinating stories of both the ship models and the vessels they represent.

Tuesday 17th June: Discovering Glasgow's Suffragettes & Suffragists
Discover the inspiring stories of Glasgow’s suffragettes and suffragists. Join Social History Curator Fiona Hayes on this tour to find out who they were, why the vote was so important and what they did to get it.

Tuesday 5th August: Canton Fans and Fashion
Canton fans, created for export to the Western world, are considered a unique form of craftsmanship combining Eastern and Western traditions in an intriguing way. It makes them one of the many luxuries China has exported to the world throughout history. These highly decorative fans, often selling for hundreds or thousands of pounds at auction houses, were extremely popular accessories in the 18th and 19th centuries. Join our Curator of Chinese Art Yupin Chung and Curator of Dress and Textiles Rebecca Quinton for a fascinating tour looking at a selection of high-quality fans made in Canton, the present-day Guangzhou, to explore the link between two cultures.

Tuesday 19th August: The Glasgow Boys and the Designing of the City Chambers murals
Come and see some of the preparatory designs that the Glasgow Boys made for the murals they carried out for Glasgow’s new City Chambers, finished in 1888. The Glasgow Boys, having carried out murals for the International Exhibition in Glasgow in 1888 were offered the commission. Their murals reanimated Glasgow’s ancient and medieval past, and controversially addressed the modern industrial city too. Led by Curator of British Art, Jo Meacock.

Tuesday 16th September: An Hour with the Four
This always popular tour offers a chance to look in detail at works by 'The Four': Charles Rennie Mackintosh, Margaret Macdonald, Frances Macdonald and James Herbert McNair. From early collaborative graphic works to exquisite watercolours, furniture design and interior decoration this tour led by Alison Brown, Curator for European Decorative Art and Design 1800-present, gives an insight into the history, making and symbolism of their work and of some of their contemporaries. Early booking is advised.

Tuesday 7th October: Celebratring Joyce Laing - an extraordinary art therapist
This tour celebrates the work and collection of Joyce Laing, Scotland's pioneering art therapist. It will review her Art Extraordinary collection and work in Barlinnie Prison's Special Unit from the 1970s to 1980s

Tuesday 4th November: Ship Models in Detail
Join this tour of the Ship Model store to see Clyde shipbuilding in miniature with a detailed look at liners, paddle steamers and battleships. Find out more about how ship models were made and used.


Tours are FREE but limited to 15 spaces. Please email GMRCBookings@glasgowlife.org.uk or phone 0141 276 9300 to book your place.

Additional Dates: 04 February 2025, 18 February 2025, 04 March 2025, 18 March 2025, 01 April 2025, 06 May 2025, 20 May 2025, 03 June 2025, 17 June 2025, 05 August 2025, 19 August 2025, 16 September 2025, 07 October 2025, 04 November 2025

Sponsored Links

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City Of Glasgow Chorus
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