The well-known education service began in 1984 with the secondment of Gillian Wolfe – an ILEA art teacher – to the Gallery for the purpose of making the collection more accessible to London schools.

However, an education service actually began at the start of the 19th century and John Soane would have liked to have been able to design a section of the building specifically for arts education.

The paintings were used right from the start as a study collection for the general public, as can be seen from the following quotations from ‘A History of Dulwich Picture Gallery’ 1835:

‘the number of students in the gallery having become so great as to be inconvenient to the public’.

‘Students must attend regularly, at least one full day per week on pain of expulsion.’

‘A group of houses in some road provided apartments for students, many artists settled in nearby Brixton, an increasingly fashionable village about a mile away.’

‘On dull days go and study in the ‘sweet quiet’ of Dulwich Gallery – the lighting being so good.’

At Dulwich Picture Gallery we are happy to continue the education service in the spirit of the founders