21st century
The second extension was funded by Sir Christopher Ondaatje and a
£12m Heritage Lottery Fund grant, and was designed by London based
architects Edward Jones and Jeremy Dixon.
The Ondaatje Wing opened in
2000 and occupies a narrow space of land between the two 19th-century
buildings of the National Gallery and the National Portrait Gallery, and is
notable for its immense, two-storey escalator that takes visitors to the earliest
part of the collection, the Tudor portraits.
In January 2008, the Gallery received its largest single donation to date,
a £5m gift from Aston Villa Chairman and U.S. billionaire Randy Lerner.
In January 2012, HRH the Duchess of Cambridge announced the National
Portrait Gallery as one of her official patronages.
Her portrait was unveiled in
January 2013.
In addition to the busts of the three founders of the gallery over the
entrance, the exterior of two of the original 1896 buildings are decorated with
stone block busts of eminent portrait artists, biographical writers and
historians. These busts, sculpted by Frederick R. Thomas, depict James
Granger, William Faithorne, Edmund Lodge, Thomas Fuller, The Earl of
Clarendon, Horace Walpole, Hans Holbein the Younger, Sir Anthony van
Dyck, Sir Peter Lely, Sir Godfrey Kneller, Louis François Roubiliac, William
Hogarth, Sir Joshua Reynolds, Sir Thomas Lawrence and Sir Francis
Chantrey.
The National Portrait Gallery's total income in 2007–2008 amounted to
£16,610,000, the majority of which came from government grant-in-
aid (£7,038,000) and donations (£4,117,000).
As of 31 March 2008, its net
assets amounted to £69,251,000.
[16]
In 2008, the NPG had 218 full-time
equivalent employees.
It is an exempt charity under English law.
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