NEXT IMPORTANT STEP,

Auckland Star, Volume LX, Issue 181, 2 August 1929, Page 3

NEXT IMPORTANT STEP,

SECURING CO-OPERATION,

UNITY OF INTERESTS,

To secure the co-operation of the Auckland Grammar School Board would be the next important step, said Sir George Fowlds, in commenting on the scheme. Since the opening of the new university arts building in Princes Street in March, 1926, he added, the university authorities had been giving attention to the preparation of a plan. Bodies interested in the scheme included the University College, the Society of Arts, the Amateur Operatic Society, and the Little Theatre Society. Delay, however, had made some of the bodies a little restless. The Arts Society had considered alternative proposals and had approached the City Council with the idea of obtaining a permanent home in a new civic art gallery. Everyone recognised the need of a new art gallery, and that need had suggested the scheme of uniting the organisations concerned in cultural education w;th the university college council, to prepare an enlarged scheme. Collaboration in that way would enable a fuller use to be made of the total accommodation.

The objective was to make provision in Auckland for a new school of fine arts, and also for the School of Architecture and the School of Music. To bring this about it would be essential to create a sufficient endowment to enable the School of Fine Arts to carrj on satisfactorily. Much consideration, said Sir George, had been given io the question of a site, and there was no doubt that the old Grammar School site in Symonds Street was eminently suitable. By the removal of the present wooden building ample space would be available for the erection of a university school which would meet the requirements of all the interested bodies.

"If full co-operation can be secured," he concluded, ,"I am quite confident the public and institutions of Auckland will provide the necessary finance for such a supremely important addition to the aesthetic and cultural interests of Auckland."