Scarborough Art Gallery is an art gallery in the English town of Scarborough. It is housed in a Grade II* Italianate villa in Scarborough’s Crescent, designed by Richard Hey Sharp (1793-1853). The gallery is administered by the Scarborough Museums Trust and is open to the public. Its permanent collection has been developed over the past seventy years through gifts, bequests and purchases. Art in the Scarborough Art Gallery The permanent collection includes paintings donated by famous hotelier Tom Laughton, the brother of the film star and actor Charles Laughton. Artists such as John Atkinson Grimshaw, John Jackson, Matthew Smith and Frank Brangwyn are represented in the collection. A number of the works held are by artists connected to Scarborough School of Art – in particular, its head, Albert Strange and his students Richard Edward Clarke and William Littlewood. Both Eric Ravilious and Edward Bawden, who were close friends, became acquainted with Tom Laughton, who acted as a patron, particularly to Bawden and commissioned pieces from him to adorn his hotels. The Peep Show in the collection was commissioned by Laughton as a plaything for guests at The Royal Hotel. Pieces by John Armstrong are also part of the Laughton gift, some of which were purchased by Tom and some by his brother Charles for their hotels, The Royal and The Pavilion. The idea that the Scarborough Art Gallery should become a repository for the Printmakers Council archive was first proposed in the early 1990s and the first deposition arrived in 1992. In December 2016 the Printmakers Council agreed to deposit new material on a biennial basis. The range of modern prints includes works by John Piper, Elizabeth Blackadder, Ossip Zadkine and Kenneth Rowntree. The collection also contains posters centred on the town of Scarborough, designed by a variety of artists for the London and North Eastern Railway. History of the Gallery The history of the building which today houses Scarborough Art Gallery began in 1828, when local solicitor and Town Clerk, John Uppleby, in partnership with local builders John Barry and his brother William, bought the land on which The Crescent would be built from the wealthy local banker and shipowner, John Tindall. In 1830, the York architect Richard Hey Sharp (who also designed Scarborough's Rotunda Museum) and his brother Samuel were commissioned to draw up plans for the site. Building in what was to become The Crescent started in