Buckingham Palace Picture Gallery re-display unveiled for summer

This article was first published by Museums + Heritage Advisor.

Picture Gallery re-hang nearly doubles paintings on show from 63 to 120, with works by Rubens, Caravaggio and Zoffany on display from 9 July.

Buckingham Palace’s Picture Gallery has undergone a re-display that nearly doubles the number of paintings on show from 63 to 120, ahead of the State Rooms opening to visitors on 9 July.

The gallery is one of the State Rooms that open to visitors each summer. The re-display puts on show 120 works from the Royal Collection, including paintings by Rubens, Caravaggio and Zoffany.

Curators drew on historic watercolours, photographs, inventories and architectural schemes to devise the new display, which took 875 hours to hang and brings the room closer to its historic appearance. New emerald-green silk wall hangings and updated lighting have also been installed.

Anna Reynolds, Surveyor of The King’s Pictures, said: “This re-hang is an exciting and rare opportunity to significantly increase the number of world-class paintings on display for visitors, in line with our charitable aim to share as much of the Royal Collection as possible.”

The Picture Gallery was designed to display George IV’s paintings collection and was part of architect John Nash’s transformation of Buckingham House into Buckingham Palace. George IV died before the project was completed, with the first arrangement hung by the time Queen Victoria acceded in 1837. The gallery is used by the Royal Family to host guests, including heads of state, and is seen by more than half a million visitors each year.

A highlight of the re-display is The Tribuna of the Uffizi by Johan Zoffany, which depicts the Florentine gallery filled with works and visitors. Although commissioned by Queen Charlotte, the painting was never hung in her apartments, and was later recorded in the Picture Gallery in 1841. It forms part of a new display illustrating British art in the 18th century, reflecting Queen Victoria’s hang in the 1840s, which also includes A Rough Dog by George Stubbs and Thomas Gainsborough’s portrait of Johann Christian Fischer.

The summer opening of Buckingham Palace runs from 9 July to 27 September 2026.