Grant For New Art Gallery

Press, Volume CIII, Issue 30603, 20 November 1964, Page 12

Grant For New Art Gallery

The people of Christchurch are indebted to the Minister of Internal Affairs (Mr Seath) for breaking the deadlock on the siting of the new art gallery and the use of the old art gallery site for the new law courts. The transfers have been contemplated for a long time; but the Canterbury Society of Arts was not prepared to leave its present gallery, unsuitable though it is, until it had some assurance of finance for a new one in Gloucester street, on a site to be obtained from the Crown in part payment for the society’s land. As such a project appeared to be eminently suitable for the support of the Queen Elizabeth II Arts Council, established earlier this year, a grant was confidently expected. The confidence appears to have been misplaced; but Mr Seath, as chairman of the Golden Kiwi Board of Control, has come to the rescue with a promise of £20,000.

The grant will enable the society to plan a modern gallery in which appreciation of the visual arts, and training in them, can be fostered. Not the least of the methods the society can now adopt is in designing the building, which should be a challenge to the architect to produce a thing of beauty and a cultural asset to the city. If he does so the society should be able to count on whatever public help it needs to complete the project. The transaction has, however, utilitarian as well as aesthetic value. Without the land occupied by the old art gallery the Justice Department could not make full and efficient use of its own property commanding and dignified though the site is. It will now have the whole block, bounded by Victoria square and Armagh, Durham, and Chester streets, to develop. That should provide adequately for all the department’s functions. At the same time the people of Christchurch have a right to expect that so fine a situation will have buildmgS’ and landscaping, worthy of it. The Ministry of Works architects will have no need to clutter the u’hole block with masonry and glass to the exclusion of trees, shrubs, and lawns. The Government has an opportunity here to make a valuable contribution to the future civic square.