Without King Charles I’s passion for collecting we would not have the Royal Collection, the largest privately-owned art collection in the world; without King Charles II we would have lost the magnificent collection his father had amassed, and King Charles III is the owner of the Royal Collection today.

Lecture One 10.30

On becoming King, Charles I purchased the fabulous art collection of the Gonzaga Dukes of Mantua. He engaged Rubens to paint the ceiling of the Banqueting House and he appointed van Dyck as his court artist, but in amassing his great collection he bankrupted England and alienated his people. Charles I was our most tragic monarch and yet he was also our single greatest royal collector of art.

Lecture Two

On being restored to the throne in 1660 Charles II’s first act as monarch was to recover as much as possible of his father’s magnificent collection of art. He received 28 paintings and 12 antique sculptures, the so-called "Dutch Gift”, from the States of Holland and realised that art could be used as bargaining chips in diplomacy.

During his reign he amassed over 1000 paintings and was instrumental in creating his own image as King. He transformed Windsor Castle into a magnificent Baroque Palace in the manner of his cousin King Louis XIV’s Palace of Versailles and used art as a symbol of power.

Lecture Three

King Charles III is a keen artist and has painted watercolours since the 1970’s. In 2000 he co-founded the Royal Drawing School to address the lack of observational drawing in art education and he has set up a Traditional Skills Centre at Dumfries House.  

In 2018, in an exhibition marking his 70th birthday, he selected his personal top 25 historical works from the Royal Collection. King Charles III is our most culturally attuned monarch in over a century.