Institutions with restrictions on loan requests.

The Barber Institute of Fine Arts Due to forthcoming refurbishment works, The Barber Institute will be unable to process loan requests. Subject to the usual 12 months’ notice for international loans, and 9 months’ notice for UK loans, they welcome loan requests for exhibitions opening from January 2026. All loan requests that have already been agreed will be honoured. For any queries please contact: v.a.skelding-bloor@bham.ac.uk

The British Library  have changed their required minimum lead in time to borrow for UK venues to 12 months. The requirement of 12 months for international venues (including tours originating in the UK) remains the same. Any queries, please write to RegistrarsOffice@bl.uk

The National Gallery Will honour all existing commitments, but bicentenary projects will restrict ability to lend from January 2023 until August 2026. 

Institutions that are not currently taking loan requests.

The RAF Museum outward loans programme is currently closed due to their team’s commitments to other projects.

Horniman Museum and Gardens Due to the Nature + Love project, the Horniman has implemented a moratorium on loans out, effective from January 2022, expected to last until circa 2025-26.

The Arts Council Collection are preparing for their next chapter in our history with exciting plans for a new collection store in Coventry. As the UK’s major lender of modern and contemporary British art this will mean more opportunities for the British public’s art collection to be used and enjoyed both nationally and internationally. In prioritising their collection move we have a loans moratorium in place as we prepare to move the collection to its new home in Coventry. They are honouring existing agreed loans and from this point onwards unable to loan from the Collection until early 2026. Any queries please do not hesitate to contact us:  loans@southbankcentre.co.uk

The Metropolitan Museum of Art Major construction project to reimagine its current modern and contemporary galleries in the form of the new Oscar L. Tang and H.M. Agnes Hsu-Tang Wing. Due to significant demands associated with this project, including orchestrating the movement of the entire collection to offsite storage facilities for the duration of the project, they are instituting a moratorium on loans of works from the Modern and Contemporary Department for exhibitions slated to open January 2024 to January 2030. Loan requests that have already been approved will be honored. We hope that we will be able to resume our normal lending activities by 2030.

The Hunterian, University of Glasgow, has a moratorium in place for any new loan requests for 2023, 2024 or 2025 due to ongoing development projects. This may impact on 2026 as well. If you would like to explore potential loans for 2026 please contact us. Existing loan requests already agreed will be honoured.

National Galleries of Scotland Due to the high volume of loan requests already received and approved, National Galleries of Scotland is currently unable to consider new loan requests for loans to International & UK venues outside Scotland for exhibitions starting before 31 March 2027. Requests for loans for exhibitions opening after that date may be submitted as usual to loansout@nationalgalleries.org , however we will now require a minimum of 12 months’ notice for UK exhibitions and 18 months’ notice for international exhibitions.   All loan requests that have already been agreed will be honoured. We will continue to be open to requests from organisations in Scotland, with the appropriate notice period, and encourage Scottish venues to get in touch as soon as possible to discuss before submitting a request. Further details about the loan request process can be found on our website Managing the Collection | National Galleries of Scotland

RIBA As announced in 2022, the V&A+RIBA Architecture Partnership will come to a conclusion at the end of May 2027. As it will take some months to decant the stores and offices, our collections will be packed and moved from autumn 2026 onwards. We will therefore close to new loan requests from the 30th September 2025 until after the collection moves are completed. We will make a further announcement about when we can resume considering loan requests in due course. The exact date for this will be dependent upon our interim location.