NPG plans to tour 300 paintings each year through partnerships during its three year closure 6 Nov 2019

The National Portrait Gallery will close in June 2020 for just under three years for its major upgrade work. During this time it has announced that it will tour 300 portraits each year across the country, from Cornwall to Edinburgh. The tour will include works that are rarely loaned, alongside a programme of events supported by Art Fund and the National Lottery Heritage Fund. The extensive programme includes a partnership with York Art Gallery in 2021, an exhibition of Tudor portraits curated in partnership with the Holburne Museum in Bath in 2022 and projects with National Museums Liverpool, Laing Art Gallery, Newcastle and the Scottish National Portrait Gallery, which will then tour to other venues. There will also be a new schools outreach programme ‘Faces and Places’ across seven London Boroughs accompanied by art shown in local schools, libraries and arts centres, plus further school art projects from Wolverhampton to Teesside. NPG’s Director Dr Nicholas Cullinan said “we look forward to hearing from other organisations who are interested in working with us during this time, so that we can make the most of this extraordinary opportunity to circulate a national collection as widely as possible in both innovative and collaborative ways”. NPG has now raised £32.7m of the £35.5m needed for the upgrade, and is confident of  raising the rest. Most recently, NLHF confirmed it will be contributing £9.4m towards the redevelopment of the site. NLHF, Art Newspaper, Guardian