THE MACKELVIE PURCHASE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVIII, Issue 20869, 11 May 1931, Page 8

THE MACKELVIE PURCHASE.

The pictures bought in Europe last year for the Mackelvie Trust arrived preceded by a good deal of unfavourable comment. Now they are being prepared for exhibition. Those of the public who are interested will soon have an opportunity to satisfy their curiosity about these already debated canvases. Meantime, an advance view has not disposed of the criticism that came from overseas. The verdict is that, while some of the pictures bought have strengthened and diversified the Mackelvie collection, others have helped in neither direction. The very number acquired made this almost a foregone conclusion. There may be a disposition to suggest that since valuable and distinctive canvases have been secured, there is no need to cavil about the rest. This cannot be accepted for several reasons. The first has little to do with art, but is a question of ordinary common sense. The accommodation available for the various collections in the Art Gallery is already taxed, and the prospect of its being extended is not clear. In the circumstances to place such a strain on it as the canvases newly arrived do demands that all should bo well worth their places on the walls of the gallery. It has yet to be proved that all of them are, and it appears that the problems of those who control the gallery have been unduly increased. Again, the art conditions of a place like Auckland suggest that unquestionable merit and representative merit should be the first consideration in purchases for public exhibition. It is very doubtful whether the nearly good enough, or the just good enough, is worth while at all. Severe discrimination in selection, with authoritative opinion behind the choice, is the chief need of a public that has few opportunities to cultivate its own judgment by studying a wide range of masterpieces. That this can have been exercised in purchasing on almost a wholesale scale is scarcely possible. In a word, a few gems of art should be the objective of those entrusted with adding to the Mackelvie collection. There will probably always be differences of opinion about what constitute gems, but that is no reason for crowding the walls of the gallery with pictures nobody would give that title.