Blackburn Museum and Art Gallery has a good range of oil paintings, watercolours and one of the largest public collections of Japanese woodblock prints in the UK outside of London.

We have a good range of oil paintings, mostly from the Victorian period. The oil collection includes Love of the Winds and The Seasons by celebrated Pre-Raphaelite artist Albert Moore. Frederic Lord Leighton’s Cherries: Mother and Child is often on tour internationally (it has been in China and Japan, recently) but if you’re lucky you can catch it on display here!

Our watercolour collection is not on permanent display, as light fades the delicate surface of the paintings. We bring them out for temporary exhibitions, or researchers/members of the public are able to make appointments to see specific items. The big names in our watercolour collection include J. M. W. Turner, Thomas Girtin and David Cox.

T. B. Lewis left his outstanding collection of Japanese woodblock prints to Blackburn Museum & Art Gallery when he died. It is one of the largest collections of such prints outside London. Included is a version of Hokusai’s The Wave, and a significant proportion of Hiroshige’s famous series 60-Odd Provinces and 53 Stations of the Tokaido Road.