In measuring the superficial contents of wall space for hanging pictures in the present and proposed galleries, the same proportion holds good. The hanging space in the present National Gallery is 10,000 square feet, which would be increased to 20,000 square feet, whilst the 10,000 square feet of the Royal Academy would be increased 10,194 square feet.
On the lower floor, the only room now available for exhibition is that in which the Turner drawings are stored away—a room containing 900 square feet of floor area; and from the unfortunate circumstance, not to say absurd arrangement of the entrance being down a descending and dark stair, the public impression has been that the lower rooms were merely a superior kind of cellars. The public will recollect the dismal impression which the Vernon pictures made in these rooms.
[To face p. 352.]
Longitudinal Section through Central Hall. Fig. 3. *Present Level of Floor of Central Hall.
Revised Elevation. Fig. 4.
By the arrangement proposed, a space of 3,300 square feet will be available for exhibiting drawings of the old masters; and these rooms will be entered at once from the entrance-hall, by an ascending staircase, by which the disagreeable impression above alluded to would be avoided.
The proposed changes would also greatly benefit both the exhibitions and the schools of the Royal Academy. They would increase and improve the exhibiting space; giving five large rooms, instead of seven small ones, as at present: two large rooms being obtained by the suppression of four small ones. (See Figs. 1 and 2.) The Royal Academy, at present, has a room appropriated to sculpture, which has long been designated “the Cellar,” and in which works are deposited, rather than exhibited: the loss of such a room is almost a gain. Next, it would lose the dark little octagon room; which, after many efforts to make it a room for exhibition, has lapsed into the condition of an ante-room, containing a few prints. The other two rooms suppressed by the new plan are the two small side rooms at present appropriated to the architectural drawings and the miniatures; though they are confessedly far too small for their purpose.
The distribution of the increased space available for the exhibitions of the Royal Academy might be as follows:—The first great room at the top of the new staircase might be devoted to the sculptors; visitors would then pass through it, and examine the works of sculpture, instead of having to diverge to a “cellar,” as at present, or quitting the Exhibition without seeing the sculpture, as many do. As the entrance would be in the centre of the building, and lighted from the top, the sculpture might be arranged in two noble semicircles, forming a grand art entrance into the collections, and giving that importance to the sculpture which it deserves. The sculptors would thus at least double the number of their visitors. From this room the visitors would proceed into the next, where the space on the left might be devoted to architectural drawings, and that on the right to miniatures and water-colour paintings. These works, especially the architectural, would be appropriately placed, and the miniatures and pictures in water-colours would gain in richness by being viewed after the colourless marbles, and before the eye had become accustomed to the fuller richness of the paintings in oil. After thus greatly improving the exhibitions of sculpture, architecture, and water-colour paintings, there would still remain the same amount of exhibiting space as at present for oil pictures. Thus far the change is clearly a great gain to all the exhibitors.