The Grand Tour

The Grand Tour explores a cultural rite-of-passage of informal education and secular tourism undertaken on the Italian Peninsular by, predominately, young British upper-class men during the eighteenth century. The exhibition brings together a select group of artworks, archives and artefacts from the University’s collections to illustrate a sprawling topic that holds a multitude of contemporary complexities. Presenting material layered with 500 years of imaginative and myopic visions, the exhibition frames the Grand Tour from an historical perspective, showing us how it appeared−and was presented back−to those who participated in it.  Interpreting this imagery today gives us the opportunity to comprehend the profound and long-lasting global impact the Grand Tour had on the development of European cultural paradigms and institutions.

Collectors and collections are central to the subject of The Grand Tour. It is fitting therefore, that this exhibition is in acknowledgement of Terence (Terry) Lane OAM (1946-2024). An eminent curator of Australian and European decorative art, Lane complied an expansive private collection of art, rare books and ephemera over the course of his life. The Grand Tour was an important subject of his extensive collecting activity, and in 2024,  Lane gifted a collection of French, British, Italian, Dutch and Flemish prints centered on the Tour to the University of Melbourne.  Collected over a 20-year period, and intended for research and teaching, the Terence Lane Collection provides the rich contextual framework on which The Grand Tour now hangs.