Stirling Smith Art Gallery and Museum
The Stirling Smith Art Gallery and Museum – formerly The Smith Institute – has played a very special part in the history of Stirling since its foundation in 1874. Established by the bequest of artist Thomas Stuart Smith (1815–1869) on land supplied by the Burgh of Stirling, it is an historic public-private partnership which has continued to the present day. It was founded as a gallery of mainly contemporary art, with museum and library reading room ‘for the benefit of the inhabitants of Stirling, Dunblane and Kinbuck’.
Edward Robert Festing
E. R. Festing joined the South Kensington Museum in 1864. He became one of two assistant directors at the South Kensington Museum. On the retirement of the Director of the museum, Sir Philip Cunliffe-Owen, in 1893, the museum was split into an Art Museum (which subsequently became known as the Victoria and Albert Museum) and a Science Museum. Festing became the first Director of the newly formed Science Museum.