NATIONAL ART GALLERY.

Evening Post, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 94, 20 April 1912, Page 9

NATIONAL ART GALLERY.

' AUCKLAND PRESS OPINION. MONOPOLY FOT* BENEFIT OF WELLINGTON NOT APPROVED. [BX XBUGOIUwr— SPIOIAL TO THI rOST.J AUCKLAND, This Day. * The Star, in commending the action of the Wellington City Council in offering to contribute £1000 toward the purchase of pictures {yom the Bsillie collection (if an additional £5000 is raised by public subscription), says: " W© hope that our own Art Society will endeavour •to make the best of this unique . opportunity, and that the trustees of the M'Kelvie Gallery and the members of the City Council will emulate the public-, spirited enthusiasm of Wellington's artlovers with equally satisfactory results." The Star, however, goes on to say: "But while we give our Wellington friends full credit for the interest they are displaying in th,e cause of art, we are by no means disposed to endorse the proposal that is now being freely dis-. cussed by the Wellington newspapers — that the purchases from the Bailhe collection should form the nucleus of a National Art Gallery — for ik is obvioua that the establishment of a National Art Gallery will mean a large , Government subsidy, and that any part of the' public funds available in future fov the public support o£ art will be diverted to Wellington. This we consider would 1 inflict a serious injustice upon the other chief centres of population in the Dominion, for' the chief value of a National -Gallery is to educate 'the artistic tastes ■of the general, public, £nd in our country — because of its geographical configuration — it is clearly Impossible for any great number ol people to benefit by the establishment of a largo and expensive art collection in 'one city. We are strongly of the opinion that the State should subsidise art within reasonable limits, but if art' galleries are to be assisted by Government grants,, it appears to us ttat the only just and reasonable course that can be pursued her© i» to distribute the money applicable to_ such purposes between the four chief cities. Though we deprecate the persistent attempts that are constantly made to centralise all the public life and the public interests of the Dominion in Wellington, we can see some excuse for ' the establishment of a National Museum, or even for a National Library, there. It is not unreasonable to contend that the largest collection of aboriginal relics and, the chief storehouse of public records and documents, the material for the historians of the future, shall be located at the political capital, and the proposed transformation of the Parliamentary Library into a national institution might <be effected on Cernib that would benefit not only the people of Wellington but students and investigators and scientists hi other parts of the Dominion as well. But we can see no Auch reason tor the concentration of the country's art collections, in ohe city, and therefore we do not approve of any attempt to monopolise for the beneiit of Wellington alone such grants and subsidies as the country may .be able to &pare for the purchaseAof works of art."