Tate Liverpool gallery to close for £30m refurbishment

Tate Liverpool is to undergo a major £29.7m refurbishment, including a £10m grant from the government's Levelling Up Fund.

The art gallery and museum, at the Royal Albert Dock, will close from 16 October until 2025 for the revamp.

During the closure, Tate Liverpool will continue to host events and one-off projects at other spaces in the city.

Director Helen Legg said it was "time for us to reimagine the gallery for the 21st Century".

"Since Tate Liverpool opened 35 years ago, the experiences our audiences want to have, and the kind of work artists want to make, have both changed significantly," she said.

The renovations will develop the gallery and social spaces to create "an environment that is flexible and inviting and able to host people, art and ideas in equal measure", a spokesman said.

The gallery recently took a mobile museum - a truck filled with its art - on a tour of the streets of Merseyside to make art more accessible and inclusive.

Prince Charles opened Tate Liverpool in a converted warehouse seven years after the 1981 Toxteth riots as part of the city's Albert Dock regeneration.

Among the early exhibits was the infamous "pile of bricks" - the 120 bricks arranged in two layers by minimalist sculptor Carl Andre which was mocked in the media when it was first exhibited in London.

Tate Liverpool has since seen a wide range of exhibits from Tracy Emin's Bed to exhibitions from artists including Andy Warhol, Rene Magritte, Jackson Pollock, Leonora Carrington, JMW Turner and Claude Monet.

£10m of the funding was awarded from the government was part of a successful combined £20m bid with National Museums Liverpool for their waterfront projects.

Plans for the programme for 2024 will be announced in coming months.

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