The Gallery of Modern Art
From Glasgow
| Telephone | 0141 229 1996 |
| Fax | 0141 204 5316 |
| Address | Queen Street
G1 3AH |
The Gallery of Modern Art (GoMA) is Glasgow's main gallery of contemporary art.
Admission is free, disabled access. Open Monday - Saturday 10am to 5pm, Sunday 11am to 5pm.
GoMA is the second most visited contemporary art gallery in the United Kingdom outside London, offering a thought-provoking programme of temporary exhibitions and workshops. GoMA displays work by local and international artists as well as addressing contemporary social issues through its major biannual projects.
Opened in 1996, the Gallery of Modern Art is housed in an elegant, neo-classical building in Royal Exchange Square in the heart of Glasgow city centre. Built in 1778 as the townhouse of William Cunninghame of Lainshaw, a wealthy Glasgow tobacco lord, this building has undergone a series of different uses. It was bought in 1817 by the Royal Bank of Scotland who later moved onto Buchanan Street and then became the Royal Exchange. Reconstruction for this use was undertaken by David Hamilton between 1827 and 1832 and resulted in many additions to the building, namely the Corinthian pillars to the Queen Street facade, the cupola above and the large hall to the rear of the old house.
In 1954, Glasgow District Libraries moved the Stirling's Library into the building. When the library returned to Miller Street, the building was refurbished to house the city’s contemporary art collection.
Currently having enthralled and inspired several million visitors over seven years, the Gallery continues to evolve, developing existing and attracting new audiences. It has a dedicated Education and Access studio, facilitating workshops and artists talks for all ages and in the basement is the Learning Library. Complete with its café, free Internet access terminals, multimedia, art, and general book-lending facilities, the Library complements the contemporary visual art focus of the Gallery. Exhibits include works by David Hockney, Sebastiao Salgado and Andy Warhol as well as Scottish artists such as John Bellany and Ken Currie.
Outside the Gallery stands an equestrian statue of the Duke of Wellington which permanently has a traffic cone on its head. For many years the authorities regularly removed cones, only for them to be replaced (often the following night) by someone climbing the nearly 20 foot statue. The jauntily placed cone has come to represent, particularly in tourist guidebooks, the city's light-hearted attitude to authority, and the city authorities no longer remove Wellington's cone hat.
