$24 million exhibition ‘charts progress of modern art’

Press, 7 November 1980, Page 13

$24 million exhibition ‘charts progress of modern art’

Think of any "big name” in the world of painting over the last 100 years, and an example of the artist’s work will almost certainly be found in the $24 million Thyssen exhibition which will open in PkniefnlMirnl'i xtraalr

Renoir, Monet, Cezanne, Van Gogh, Picasso, Toulouse-Lautrec, Degas, Pissarro, Munch, Chirico, Dali, Jackson Pollock, and Andrew Wyeth are only a few of the 98 famous artists represented in the collection.

“America and Europe: A Century of Modern Masters”—worth more than any other collection that has come to New Zealand before—is part of the collections belonging to the Swiss multi-millionaire, Baron Hans Heinrich Thyssen-Bornemisza de Kaszon.

Needless to say, the staff at the Robert McDougall Art Gallery are excited about the coming exhibition. The gallery has undergone a “spruce-up” in recent months—a new paint-job, hanging system, improved lighting, and a tight new security system.

Gallery staff are sure that the exhibition will have wide public appeal. “There is something in it for every member of the family,” says Mrs Ann Betts, the gallery’s education officer.

The director, Dr Rodney Wilson, says that the collection of .106 paintings will have great educational value because it is a survey exhibition-that attempts to chart the progress of modem art.

Art lovers will have plenty of opportunity to expand their knowledge of twentieth century art. As well as having the chance to look at major paintings “in the flesh,” an impressive $lB catalogue will be available, together with a $5 booklet outlining the main art movements since Impressionism.

There will also be an audio-visual display in the gallery while the exhibition is running. Guided tours, conducted by a group of 12 volunteers who have been in training all year, will start at 11 a.m., 1 p.m., and 3 p.m., each day. Special arrangements can be made for groups between 50 and 200 people to be shown around the exhibition in the evenings.

Mrs Betts says that a lot of interest has already been shown in the exhibition, and group bookings are starting to come in.

The exhibition attracted 56,000 people in Wellington, and averaged 2000 visitors every day while in Auckland. Dr Wilson expects the response to be as good in Christchurch, with at least 40,000 viewers, and probably a great many more.

"New Zealand has had some excellent exhibitions but it has never seen a survey of twentieth century art such as this and it has never had as valuable a collection as this,” Dr Wilson adds.

He says that one of the fascinating things about a private collection is that it reveals the ideosyncracies and tastes of the owner. He agrees that the paintings in the collection show a preference for figurative work, even though the Baron also owns a collection of abstractionist paintings as well.

More important than that, Dr Wilson says, is that the exhibition has tried to show the develop-

ment of twentieth' century art in all its manifestations, rather than focussing on one particular aspect. Some museums around the world would hold better survey collections than the Thyssen exhibition, but it is a phenomenal collection to come from the resources of a single person.

Baron Thyssen-Bornemisza, who visited New Zealand for the Auckland opening of the exhibition, is listed in the “International Who’s Who” as a Swiss industrialist and administrator. He is involved with several large companies and banks, including the Alusuisse Consortium. He was once married to a former New Zealand woman.

He inherited part of his collections from his father, who had started collecting in 1937. That collection was mainly of old masters, because the Baron’s father did not approve of modern art.

Baron Thyssen inherited his father’s love of collecting and has .expanded the collections since he took them over on his father’s death in 1947. His collection of old masters is housed in one of his five villas, the Villa Favorita, in Switzerland. The modern paintings are usually kept on the walls of his houses and offices.

Dr Wilson says it is rumoured that the Baron’s total collections are worth S4OO million. One painting alone, Van Gogh’s “Les Dechargeurs a Arles,” is valued at $1.6 million.

However, for some, such as the Dunedin artists Andrew Drummond and Ralph Hotere, there is an unpleasant taint of political interest attached to the exhibition.

An article in the University of Canterbury Students’ Association newspaper “Canta” earlier this year, pointed out that it was perhaps an unfortunate coincidence that the Alusuisse Consortium had shown an interest in setting up an aluminium smelter in Aramoana when the possibility of the exhibition coming to New Zealand was being discussed. One of the main sponsors for the tour is the Challenge Corporation,

Dr Wilson says that such suggestions are entirely spurious. “If the Government was intent on a smelter at Aramoana, it would have gone ahead with it regardless of the exhibition,” he adds. “I wouldn’t see the exhibition as a bribe. I am sure the Government would make its decision independently.”

The visit to New Zealand of an exhibition of this size was only made possible by the co-operation of the art galleries in the three main centres, and Government support in the form of insurance for the paintings.

Dr-Wilson says that it would cost about $300,000 to bring the exhibition to New Zealand. The paintings, which were recently on tour in Australia, are transported on New Zealand Air Force Hercules aircraft.

With an entry fee of $2.50, Dr Wilson says the exhibition will make a profit, although it is too early to say how much. Any profit made will be held by each gallery in reserve accounts to help fund future of a similar calibre. By KAKREN BEANLAND