How large is the collection?
The Primary Collection of paintings, sculpture, miniatures, drawings, prints and photographs contains some 11,100 portraits of the most famous people in British history. Of these more than 4,150 are paintings, sculptures and miniatures, approaching 60% of which are regularly displayed at the National Portrait Gallery or elsewhere. In addition, there are some 6,800 works on paper, shown on a rotating basis of about 300 items a year. Normally items not on display can readily be made available for viewing via the Collections Manager. The Collection is also made widely available via the Woodward Portrait Explorer in the IT Gallery, by CD-Rom, on the Internet and in Gallery and other publications. The Gallery also holds Reference Collections as a national resource; they form an image bank of the nation’s famous and less famous faces. They are used for study and exhibition, and have been extensively reproduced in books and other publications. There are more than 320,000 images in the Referen
