Masterpieces from Buckingham Palace, The Queen's Gallery at Buckingham Palace

Some of the Queen’s hidden masterpieces – which usually hang in the Picture Gallery at Buckingham Palace – will go on public display in a once-in-a-lifetime exhibition this December.

Central to the exhibition of 65 paintings are outstanding works by the likes of Titian, Rembrandt, Vermeer, van Dyck and Canaletto. Visitors will be encouraged to look at the exhibited works ‘close up’ so as to engage with the creative processes of artists now celebrated the world over.

Canaletto, The Bacino di San Marco on Ascension Day, c.1733-4. Credit: Royal Collection Trust/© Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II

Among the star exhibits is Johannes Vermeer’s The Music Lesson (early 1660s), one of only 34 surviving works by the revered Dutch master. Other standout works include Portrait of Agatha Bas (1641) by Rembrandt and Rubens’s Self-Portrait from 1623, in which thinly applied pigment brilliantly conveys the translucent quality of the flesh. The exhibition will be accompanied by a display charting the history of the Picture Gallery after George III and Queen Charlotte acquired Buckingham House in 1762.

The exhibition has been made possible due to continuing renovations at Buckingham Palace. The major 10-year refurbishment project will overhaul the Palace’s essential services to ensure it can be used as a royal residence for future generations.