At 200 Years Old, the London National Gallery Is Redefining What It Means to Be a 'National' Museum

Throughout the National Gallery’s 200-year history, the London museum’s collection has served as both a cultural touchstone and a flashpoint for political swirl. In 1914, suffragist Mary Richardson strode into the gallery with a meat cleaver and slashed Diego Velázquez’s depiction of a mirrored nude woman, The Toilet of Venus (also called the Rokeby Venus), to protest the arrest of a fellow activist. During World…