This high-value and convivial Fine Art tour explores the collections of the National Gallery of Ireland, in a very special way and has been the subject of scores of rave reviews on TripAdvisor and elsewhere. For the intellectually curious visitor, it is designed to help build your skills in the interpretation and understanding of old master paintings, their symbolism and their carefully-crafted layers of meaning.
To do this we will look at world-class paintings by artists such as Fra Angelico, Mantegna, Perugino, Rembrandt, Vermeer and Caravaggio, using these to discuss their symbolism, and to help develop your ability to read symbolism. You’ll learn how to recognise popular biblical subjects in art like The Annunciation, the Lamentation and others; how to identify different saints by spotting their traditional “attributes”; even how to decode some of the religious iconography of French and Italian Renaissance masterpieces.
We offer this tour as a private activity for your own, private group, on a date of your own choosing. To book, please use the green “Book Now” button and select your preferred time and date. To book a How to Read a Painting Tour, simply choose and pay for a “Masterpieces of the National Gallery” Private Art tour, and then, upon purchase, simply use the Notes section to tell us you would like to do the “How to Read a Painting” tour instead. Thank you.
Our private art tours are available during opening hours of the National Gallery of Ireland. The current opening hours are:
Monday: 11am – 5.30pm
Tuesday to Wed 9.45.- 5.30
Thursday 9.45am- 8pm
Saturday: 9.45am – 5.30pm
Sunday: 11.30am – 5.30pm
Dublin Decoded will also offer private evening art tours (i.e. Thursday evenings only, 6-8pm). This can often be a particularly beautiful time to visit the galleries, with optimum viewing conditions to enjoy the old master works in calm and peace – at times with almost exclusive access to many of the galleries.
This tour is also sometimes run as a public tour open to all. Please check the“Public Tours” page of our website. The best way to hear about our upcoming public tours is to sign up to the Dublin Decoded monthly newsletter.
