Art historian and museum curator Dame Rosalind Savill dies age 73

Dame Rosalind Savill, who was the director of one of the UK’s major art collections for nearly 20 years, has died age 73.

The former Wallace Collection director and art historian died on Friday following a short illness, her family confirmed to the PA news agency.

She began her career as an assistant in the ceramics department of London’s Victoria And Albert Museum, before moving to the Wallace Collection.

Dame Rosalind was first appointed as an assistant in 1974 and became an assistant director of the London fine art attraction in 1978.

She took over as director in 1992, a position she held until 2011.

Built over the 18th and 19th centuries by the Marquesses of Hertford and Sir Richard Wallace, the Wallace Collection is a national museum in Manchester Square housing paintings, sculptures, furniture, porcelain and arms and armour.

Dame Rosalind oversaw many developments including the expansion as part of the museum’s Centenary project.

She published a three-volume catalogue of the Sevres porcelain in the Wallace Collection, as well as Everyday Rococo: Madame De Pompadour And Sevres Porcelain, a chronology of the daily life and purchases of the mistress of King Louis XV of France.

Dame Rosalind also appeared in a 2013 BBC Four programme, Beautiful Thing: A Passion For Porcelain, where she told the story of Sevres porcelain.

She was made a CBE for her services to the study of ceramics in 2000 and in 2009 she received a damehood for services to the arts.

Dame Rosalind was president and one of the founders of the French Porcelain Society and a regular adviser on Sevres to museums, collectors, dealers and auction houses around the world.

She was also on several advisory committees, including for English Heritage and the Royal Mint, as well as a trustee of Somerset House and the Campaign For Museums.