High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! Manchester Art Gallery is a free-to-view municipally- owned public art gallery in Manchester City Centre in the North West of England.The Gallery was extended by Hopkins Architects in May 2002 to take in the old Manchester Athenaeum building (Sir Charles Barry, architect, 1826) next door, and now occupies three buildings. One building is the Grade I listed building that was originally the Royal Manchester Institution designed by Barry in 1824.