WORCESTER City Art Gallery and Museum says it is welcoming world class art this year.

At the heart of the attractions will be "fantastic loans" from The Tate, Manchester Art Gallery and the Ashmolean Museum.

A spokesman said: "This year the Foregate Street Museum has worked hard to bring the best of the nation's artworks to your doorstep."

The celebrations can start with the launch of the 'This Green Earth' exhibition, on Saturday, February 13.

The spokesman said: "As well as welcoming Worcestershire artist Bridget Macdonald to the Art Gallery, curators are also pleased to bring in incredible loans of work from the Ashmolean Museum and Manchester Art Gallery by great masters of landscape painting, including Claude Lorrain, Samuel Palmer and Peter Paul Rubens, making this a spring exhibition not to be missed."

The summer show will offer family fun with "Pirates, Pants and Wellyphants".

The spokesman added: "This will feature the work of Britain's best-loved illustrator, Nick Sharratt.

"Visitors can step into Nick's recreated studio, see if they are faster than the Hundred-Mile-An-Hour-Dog and even design their own pants to add to the display."

Pirates, Pants and Wellyphants opens on July 9 and will be on throughout the summer holidays "with plenty of welly-tastic activities to keep children entertained".

Later in the year the venue stages an exhibition of work by Turner-Prize winning artist Jeremy Deller, who is widely-regarded one of the most significant artists of his generation.

The exhibition, "Jeremy Deller: The Battle of Orgreave" focuses on the miners' strike of the 1980s, making comparisons to the English Civil War.

Further details at, www.museumsworcestershire.org.uk.