Arts and Culture

Recently voted top UK city for architecture and culture by the Conde Naste Reader's Travel Awards 2006, Oxford has art and culture in abundance.

The world famous University museums of Ashmolean Museum, Museum of the History of Science, Bate Collection of Musical Instruments, Oxford University Museum of Natural History and Pitt Rivers Museum are home to unrivalled collections. The Ashmolean Museum is the oldest public museum in the world, established in 1683.

Alongside these historic museums there are a range of cutting edge contemporary galleries such as Modern Art Oxford, OVADA and the O3 Gallery - hosting collections from international artists to local Oxfordshire based ones.

Oxford also offers a host of entertainment from theatre to college concerts. Theatres include the New Theatre, the Oxford Playhouse, the Burton Taylor Theatre and Pegasus Theatre. The Sheldonian Theatre and the Jaqueline du Pre building offer various recitials and concerts by Oxford Philomusica or Oxford Contemporary Music.

Oxford has strong links with Shakespeare in history to the current day.  In 1593, Shakespeare's players are thought to have performed "Hamlet" at the Golden Cross in Oxford on route between London and Stratford-upon-Avon. During the summer months there are performances of Shakespeare in college gardens by the Oxford Shakespeare Company and Headington Hill Park by the locally-based Creation Theatre Company.  Creation Theatre Company continue performances through the winter with performances in the ornate setting of the mirrored Spiegel Tent, in the grounds of BMW Group Plant Oxford at Cowley.

For more information click here for the official Oxford visitor website: www.visitoxford.org