Tate Modern facts for kids

Quick facts for kids
Tate Modern

Lua error in Module:Location_map at line 420: attempt to index field 'wikibase' (a nil value).
Established	2000; 25 years ago (2000)
Location	Bankside London, SE1 United Kingdom
Visitors	4,742,038 (2023)
Public transit access	Blackfriars
Tate
Tate Britain Tate Liverpool Tate Modern Tate St Ives

Tate Modern is a famous art gallery in London, England. It holds the United Kingdom's national collection of international modern and contemporary art. This means art made from the year 1900 onwards.

Tate Modern is part of the Tate group, which also includes Tate Britain, Tate Liverpool, and Tate St Ives. The gallery is located in a building that used to be a power station, called Bankside Power Station. It's in the Bankside area of London.

It is one of the biggest museums for modern and contemporary art in the world. You can visit the main art collections for free. However, you need to buy tickets for special, temporary exhibitions.

In 2020, the museum had to close for a long time because of the COVID-19 pandemic. This meant fewer people visited. But by 2022, visitor numbers grew a lot. It became the third most visited museum in Britain and the fourth most visited art museum globally.

The closest train and London Underground station is Blackfriars. It's about 550 yards (0.5 km) away from the gallery.

How Tate Modern Began

From Power Station to Art Gallery

The Turbine Hall, a huge space inside Tate Modern.

For many years, the Tate art collection was shared with Tate Britain. But in 2000, Tate Modern opened in its own building. This building used to be the Bankside Power Station.

Sir Giles Gilbert Scott, who also designed Battersea Power Station, designed the power station. It was built in two stages between 1947 and 1963. The building is right across the River Thames from St Paul's Cathedral. The power station stopped working in 1981.

The power station was a very long brick building with a tall chimney. Inside, it had a huge main area called the Turbine Hall. There was also a boiler house and a switch house.

Turning the Power Station into a Museum

After the power station closed, many people worried it would be knocked down. They wanted to save the building and find a new use for it. In 1994, the Tate Gallery announced that Bankside would become the new Tate Modern.

An international competition was held to choose an architect. Herzog & de Meuron won the competition in 1995. The work to change the power station into Tate Modern began in June 1995 and finished in January 2000. It cost £134 million.

One big change on the outside was adding a two-story glass section to the roof. Inside, much of the original building was kept. This included the very large Turbine Hall, which still has its old overhead crane. Part of the building, the Switch House, still holds an electrical substation for a power company. Tate Modern uses the northern Boiler House for its main exhibition spaces.

Panoramic view from a balcony at Tate Modern.

Expanding the Museum

Tate Modern became much more popular than expected. So, plans to make it bigger started in 2004. The goal was to add a lot more space for art, almost doubling the size of the display areas.

Part of the building was still used by a power company. In 2006, they gave up some of their space. Plans were made to build a new tower there, which was finished in 2016. This new tower was built over old oil storage tanks, which were turned into spaces for performance art.

The expansion project cost about £215 million at first. Money came from the UK government, the London Development Agency, and many generous donations. In 2013, Eyal Ofer, a shipping and property businessman, gave £10 million. This helped the project get most of the money it needed.

The Tanks

The first part of the expansion was to change three large, round, underground oil tanks. These tanks were originally used by the power station. They were turned into new display areas and facilities. They opened in July 2012.

Two of the Tanks are now used to show live performance art and art installations. The third tank is used for other museum needs. Tate describes them as the "world's first museum galleries permanently dedicated to live art."

The Switch House

Exterior of the Switch House, the new tower at Tate Modern.

A new ten-story tower, about 65 meters tall, was built above the oil tanks. This new building opened to the public in June 2016.

The design of the new building, also by Herzog & de Meuron, was unique. It has a sloping brick pattern on its outside, matching the old power station.

This extension added a lot more space for art displays, performance areas, and educational facilities. It also has offices, places to eat, shops, and a car park.

In 2017, the Switch House was officially renamed the Blavatnik Building. This was to thank Sir Leonard Blavatnik, who gave a lot of money towards the £260 million cost of the extension.

What You Can See Inside

The art collections at Tate Modern include international modern and contemporary art. All the art dates from 1900 to today.

Levels 2, 3, and 4 have gallery spaces. Each of these floors has a large east and west wing, with many rooms in each. The Boiler House part of the museum shows art from 1900 to the present day.

The Switch House has eleven floors, from 0 to 10. Levels 0, 2, 3, and 4 have gallery spaces. Level 0 includes the Tanks, which are the converted oil tanks. The Switch House shows art from 1960 to the present day.

The Turbine Hall is a single, very large space that runs through the middle of the building. It is six stories tall, showing the full height of the original power station. This huge space is used to display very large artworks.

Art Shows and Exhibitions

Main Art Collection Displays

A gallery at Tate Modern.

The main art collection displays are organized into 8 areas. Each area has a theme or subject. Some rooms within these areas change regularly, showing different artworks that fit the theme. The themes themselves change less often. You don't need to pay to see these main collection areas.

As of June 2016, some of the themed areas included:

• Start Display: This shows works by important artists to help you understand modern art.
• Artist and Society
• In The Studio
• Materials and Objects
• Media Networks
• Between Object and Architecture
• Performer and Participant
• Living Cities

There is also a special area that shows artworks from the Artist Rooms collection.

How the Collection Displays Have Changed

The chimney of Tate Modern. The Swiss Light at its top was a temporary art installation.

When Tate Modern first opened in 2000, the art was not shown in the order it was made. Instead, it was grouped by themes. Before the Switch House opened, there were four main themes at a time.

The first themes from 2000 to 2006 were:

• History/Memory/Society
• Nude/Action/Body
• Landscape/Matter/Environment
• Still Life/Object/Real Life

In 2006, the displays were changed. They focused on important moments in 20th-century art instead of just themes. More changes happened in 2012.

Special Exhibitions

The Turbine Hall Artworks

Ólafur Elíasson's The Weather Project (2004) in the Turbine Hall.

Rachel Whiteread's EMBANKMENT (2005) in the Turbine Hall.

The Turbine Hall used to hold the power station's electricity generators. It is a huge space, five stories tall, with a floor area of 3,400 square meters. Every year, from October to March, this hall is used to show very large artworks specially made by contemporary artists.

From 2000 to 2012, a company called Unilever sponsored these artworks. After that, in 2013, Tate Modern signed a deal with Hyundai to sponsor these commissions for ten years. This was a very large sponsorship deal for a museum in the UK.

Many famous artists have created works for the Turbine Hall. Some of them include:

More recently, artists like Abraham Cruzvillegas, Philippe Parreno, Superflex, Tania Bruguera, Kara Walker, Anicka Yi, Cecilia Vicuña, and El Anatsui have created works for the Hyundai series.

When there isn't a special art series, the Turbine Hall is used for other events and exhibitions. For example, it has shown Damien Hirst's For The Love of God and hosted music performances.

Major Temporary Exhibitions

Two parts of the Boiler House are used for big temporary exhibitions. You usually need to pay an entry fee for these. These shows typically last for three or four months.

A 2014 exhibition of Henri Matisse's work was very popular. It had over 562,000 visitors, making it London's most attended paid exhibition at the time. In 2018, Joan Jonas had a special show.

An exhibition called A Year in Art: Australia 1992, which showed contemporary Indigenous Australian art, was so popular it was extended until September 2022.

The Tanks

The Tanks are on Level 0. They are three large underground oil tanks and other connecting rooms that were part of the original power station. They have been made new for the gallery. One tank shows installation and video art made specially for the space. Smaller areas show video art from the museum's collection. The Tanks have also been used for live music events.

Other Exhibition Areas

Sometimes, artworks are also shown in the museum's restaurants and members' rooms. Other places that have been used in the past include a mezzanine level and the outside of the Boiler House building.

Other Things to Do at Tate Modern

Besides the art exhibitions, Tate Modern has many other facilities:

• A large space in one of the Tanks on Level 0 hosts a changing program of performances. Sometimes there's a charge for these.
• The Starr Auditorium and a seminar room on Level 1 show films and host events. There is usually a charge for these.
• The Clore Education Centre, Clore Information Room, and McAulay Studios on Level 0 are for visiting schools and educational groups.
• There are several shops selling books, art prints, and gifts.
• You can find a cafe, an espresso bar, a restaurant and bar, and a members' room for food and drinks.
• Tate Modern also has a community garden, which it manages with the Bankside Open Spaces Trust.

Getting There

Tate Modern on the opening day of the Millennium Bridge in 2000.

The closest station is Blackfriars, which has a new south entrance. Other nearby stations include Southwark, and St Paul's and Mansion House north of the river. You can reach the stations north of the river by walking across the Millennium Bridge. Orange lampposts guide visitors from Southwark tube station to Tate Modern.

There is also a riverboat pier right outside the gallery called Bankside Pier. You can take regular passenger boats from here to the Docklands and Greenwich. There's also a special "Tate to Tate" boat service that connects Tate Modern with Tate Britain.

To the west of Tate Modern, an area is being redeveloped.

Transport Options

Service	Station/Stop	Lines/Routes served	Distance from Tate Modern
London Buses	Blackfriars Bridge	381, N343, N381	0.2-mile walk
	Blackfriars Bridge / South Side	40, 63, N63, N89	0.2-mile walk
	Southwark Bridge / Bankside Pier	344	0.4-mile walk
London Underground	Southwark		0.4-mile walk
National Rail	Blackfriars	Thameslink, Southeastern	0.5-mile walk
	London Bridge	Thameslink, Southern, Southeastern	0.7-mile walk
London River Services	Bankside Pier	Commuter Service Tate to Tate Westminster to St Katharine's Circular

• At the exit of Southwark tube station, orange lamposts direct visitors to Tate Modern.

Directors of Tate Modern

The following people have been in charge of Tate Modern:

• Lars Nittve (1998–2001)
• Vicente Todolí (2003–2010)
• Chris Dercon (2010–2016)
• Frances Morris (2016–2023)
• Karin Hindsbo (2023–Present)

Protests at the Gallery

Since 2010, an art group called Liberate Tate has held protests at Tate Modern. They want the Tate to stop taking money from BP as a sponsor. They believe BP's actions harm the environment and want the museum to show it cares about these issues. In June 2015, a group of artists stayed inside Tate Modern for 25 hours as part of a protest.

Safety and Incidents

There have been a few serious incidents at Tate Modern involving falls from the balconies. In 2019, a young child was seriously injured after being pushed from a high floor. The child survived but had life-changing injuries.

Paintings from the Collection

• 

  Georges Braque, 1909–10, La guitare (Mandora, La Mandore)

• 

  Pablo Picasso, 1909–10, Figure dans un Fauteuil (Seated Nude, Femme nue assise)

• 

  Albert Gleizes, 1911, Portrait de Jacques Nayral

• 

  Robert Delaunay, 1912, Windows Open Simultaneously (First Part, Third Motif)

• 

  Juan Gris, 1914, The Sunblind

• 

  Claude Monet, 1916, Water-Lilies

• 

  Paul Klee, 1921, Abenteuer eines Fräuleins (A Young Lady's Adventure)

• 

  Paul Klee, 1935, Walpurgisnacht (Walpurgian Night)

• 

  Robert Delaunay, 1934, Endless Rhythm

See Also

In Spanish: Tate Modern para niños

• List of most visited museums in the United Kingdom
• List of most visited art museums
• List of largest art museums
• List of museums in London