A £10m redevelopment of Whitechapel Art Gallery in the East End of London is underway.

The scheme will increase the arts establishment’s gallery space by 78 per cent, by incorporating and transforming the neighbouring Passmore Edwards library building.

Additional facilities will include a new Collections Gallery to provide public access to important art collections; a Commissions Gallery to give a new platform for an annual art commission; a Permanent Gallery and Research Room for the Gallery’s historic archive and an Education and Research Tower to incorporate studios and galleries.

The new development was designed by Belgian architects Robbrecht en Daem, alongside Witherford Watson Mann Architects in London and artist Rachel Whiteread.

Contractor Wallis, who worked on the redevelopment of the V&A Museum of Childhood, is already carrying out work on site.

Funding came from the Heritage Lottery Fund (£3.3m), Arts Council England (£650,000), London Development Agency (£350,000) and charitable trusts, individual donors and commercial galleries (£1.6m).

The Gallery was built in 1901, according to the design of Charles Harrison Townsend, to bring art to the East End population. It was the only gallery to showcase Picasso’s masterpiece Guernica in Britain and presented the first major British show of American abstract expressionist Jackson Pollock in 1958. In the 1970s, David Hockney, Gilbert & George and Richard Long had their first works of art displayed at the gallery.