Birmingham Art Gallery. Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery is a museum and art gallery in Birmingham, England. It has a collection of international importance covering fine art, ceramics, metalwork, jewellery, natural history, archaeology, ethnography, local history and industrial history. The museum/gallery is run by Birmingham Museums Trust, the largest independent museums trust in the United Kingdom, which also runs eight other museums around the city. Entrance to the Museum and Art Gallery is free, but some major exhibitions in the Gas Hall incur an entrance fee. In 1829, the Birmingham Society of Artists created a private exhibition building in New Street, Birmingham while the historical precedent for public education around that time produced the Factory Act 1833, the first instance of Government funding for education. The Museums Act 1845 boroughs with a population of 10,000 or more to raise a 1/2d for the establishment of museums. In 1864, the first public exhibition room, was opened when the Society and other donors presented 64 pictures as well as the Sultanganj Buddha to Birmingham Council and these were housed in the Free Library building but, due to lack of space, the pictures had to move to Aston Hall. Joseph Nettlefold bequeathed twenty-five pictures by David Cox to Birmingham Art Gallery on the condition it opened on Sundays. In June 1880, local artist Allen Edward Everitt accepted the post of honorary curator of the Free Art Gallery, a municipal institution which was the forerunner of the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery. Jesse Collings, Mayor of Birmingham 1878-79, was responsible for free libraries in Birmingham and was the original proponent of the Birmingham Art Gallery. A E10,000 gift by Sir Richard and George Tangye started a new drive for an art gallery and, in 1885, following other donations and E40,000 from the council, the Prince of Wales officially opened the new gallery on Saturday 28 November 1885. The Museum and Art Gallery occupied an extended part of the Council House above the new offices of the municipal Gas Department. The building was designed by Yeoville Thomason. The metalwork for the new building was by the Birmingham firm of Hart, Son, Peard & Co. and extended to both the interior and exterior including the distinctive cast-iron columns in the main gallery space for the display of decorative art. The lofty portico, surmounted by a pediment by Francis John Williamson, representing an allegory of Birmingham contributing to the fine arts, was together with the clock-tower considered themost conspicuous features of the exterior upon its opening. By 1900 the collection, especially its contemporary British holdings, was deemed by the Magazine of Art to be one of the finest and handsomest in Britain. Until 1946, when property taxes were voted towards acquisitions, the museum relied on the generosity of private individuals. John Feeney provided E50,000 to provide a further gallery. Seven galleries had to be rebuilt after being bombed in 1940. Immediately after World War II Mighty Mary Mary Woodall was appointed keeper of art under director, Trenchard Cox. Woodall and Cox, through their links to the London art world, were able to attract exhibitions, much publicity and donations to the gallery. In 1956, Woodall replaced Cox when the latter became Director of the Victoria and Albert Museum. In 1951, the Museum of Science and Industry, Birmingham was incorporated into BM&AG. In 2001, the Science Museum closed with some exhibits being transferred to Thinktank, Birmingham Science Museum, which was operated by the independent Thinktank Trust that has since become part of Birmingham Museums Trust. The main entrance is located in Chamberlain Square below the clock-tower known locally as Big Brum. The entrance hall memorial reads 'By the gains of Industry we promote Art'. The Extension Block has entrances via the Gas Hall and Great Charles Street. Waterhall has its own entrance on Edmund Street. In October 2010, the Waterhall closed as a BM&AG gallery as a result of a E1.5m cut to Birmingham Museums and Art Gallery's budget in 2010-11. The last BM&AG exhibition that took place in the Waterhall at that time was the Steve McCurry Retrospective that ran from 26 to 17 June October 2010. The Waterhall and the Gas Hall have reopened for exhibitions throughout the year. BM&AG, formerly managed by Birmingham City Council, is now, with Thinktank, part of Birmingham Museums Trust.