The Understanding British Portraits Subject Specialist Network has been taking part in a Collections Mapping exercise to help create a database of all portrait collections throughout Britain. You can search the results of this exercise by clicking on the link below and searching the Understanding British Portraits Collections on Culture Grid.

Read more about the resource on this website (external link)

The Understanding British Portraits Subject specialist Network has created an expertise database. Here you will find a network of fellow professionals engaged with portraiture in a whole variety of ways: conservators, curators, dealers, researchers, learning professionals, historians and academics. The database is designed to enable the exchange of knowledge and expertise, and facilitate contact among those with common interests.

Click below to access the database;

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This toolkit gives you information on the why, what, how and who to develop a learning programme around a portraiture collection.

It provides a list of audiences, school curriculum links, theme ideas, information about learning styles and good practice case studies as well as providing links to websites and other resources.

Click on the link below to access the toolkit;

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This toolkit is designed to assist researchers to compile accurate and reliable information about a portrait or collection of portraits. The toolkit contains useful templates as well as a case study to demonstrate the research methods.

Click on the link below to access the toolkit

Read more about the resource on this website (external link)

The understanding British Portraits SSN has created this great toolkit to help interpret adn understand the language of portraits. Each section of the toolkit gives practical suggestions that have been successfully used elsewhere and there is a case study on Beningbrough Hall, Yorkshire, which provides many examples of ideas for interpretation.

Click on the link below to access the Toolkit:

Read more about the resource on this website (external link)

Reproduced with kind permission of the Institute of Conservation (ICON), for further information, visit the Conservation Register 

Picture frames and gilded objects are often more complex than they first appear to be and can be made up from a wide variety of materials. In the UK, the wooden substrate of picture and mirror frames is often a species of pine but oak, lime and a spectrum of other hard and softwoods are also found.

Published by English Heritage, this guideline provides a comprehensive introduction to the nature and management of Military Wall Art. The introduction to the guideline reads:

"Military wall art appears throughout the United Kingdom, on or within buildings that are or once were in military use. Surviving works include murals, pencil sketches, stencils, instructional drawings, signage and simple graffiti, and incorporate both sanctioned and less official forms of decoration.

One of a series of really useful templates from the Dover Museum showing an example risk assessment for a general art workshop.