YORK Art Gallery is the only museum in Britain to have been nominated for a prestigious international award.

The gallery is on a list of 46 nominees from 24 countries for the title European Museum of the Year, with the winner to be announced on May 6 at a ceremony in Zagreb, Croatia.

Reyahn King, chief executive of York Museums Trust, which runs the gallery, said that to be the only British museum on the list was ‘an incredible achievement.'

She said it was international recognition for the transformation which had taken place at the gallery, adding:”It will help us to promote the gallery and the city of York as an exciting cultural destination to new audiences across the continent.”

A spokesman said the nomination followed a visit by a judge earlier in the year. Other museums to have made the shortlist included the National Gallery, in Sofia, Bulgaria, the Musee national Picasso in Paris, France, the Swedish National Museum of Science and Technology in Stockholm and the Museum of the First President of Russia, Boris Yeltsin, in Yekaterinburg, Russia.

“This is the latest of several awards the gallery has won or been shortlisted for since its reopening after an £8 million transformation in August 2015, which saw the gallery space increase by 60 per cent, new learning spaces, a new café and a new Artists Garden,and also the creation of the Centre of Ceramic Art,” he said.

“These include winning the Family Friendly Museum of the Year and the York Visitor Attraction of the Year and being one of five finalists for the Art Fund Museum of the Year.”