ACQUIRED FOR BRITAIN

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXII, Issue 21999, 4 January 1935, Page 9

ACQUIRED FOR BRITAIN

PRICELESS ART COLLECTION RARE TREASURES INCLUDED British Wireless RUGBY, Jan. 2 The famous collection of Chinese and Far Eastern works of art which belonged to Mr. George Eumorfopoulos, of Chelsea, has been acquired for the nation by the British Museum and Victoria and Albert Museum jointly. This collection, which is one of the most extensive of its kind, is celebrated throughout the world for the quality and rarity of its specimens of sculptures, metal work, jades, gold, silver, glass, ivories, lacquer, paintings, pottery and porcelain. The national collections until now have contained few "or no examples such as are represented in the groups now acquired. The total price for which the collection was offered was £IOO,OOO, and a preliminary payment of nearly half that sum will be made in a few days. The collection will be exhibited as soon as possible, and loans from it will be available later for leading museums outside London.

Helpful contributions toward the initial payment were received from the National Art Collections Fund, Sir Percival David, and the Universities of China Committee. The collection represents 30 years' work by Mr. Eumorfopoulos, who is a member of a firm of Greek merchantbankers. He lives in London and was born in Liverpool 71 years ago. " Judged by its value," the Manchester Guardian says, " the sum of £IOO,OOO is so ridiculous that the sale becomes a princely gesture."

The Times describes the collection as literally priceless, and says that Mr. Eumorfopoulos, in allowing it to be bought ,at such a figure, ranks as a great benefactor to the national museums.

The Eumorfopoulos Collection of Chinese art has long been famous among connoisseurs the world over, and provided almost a majority of the colour and monochrome illustrations for the article on Chinese pottery and porcelain in the last edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica. In June, 1932, Mr. Eumorfopoulos opened his house at 7 Chelsea Embankment to the public for two days in aid of a fund to help the victims of disastrous floods in China. "To those who know the Eumorfopoulos Collection, the name is enough to suggest the richness of the opportunity," said the Times in a preliminary article, " to those who do not it is not easy to convev any idea of its importance except by comparison. -Formed during nearly half a century, it is in scope one of the finest in the world, ranking with the great public collections in Germany, Sweden and America, and in quality, notably in the fine wares of the Sung period, it is unexcelled anywhere. Some of the best examples of Oriental art in our museums, including the noble Chinese fresco of three figures at the British Museum, have been given or lent to them by Mr. Eumorfopoulos, and his collection as a whole has inspired the finest illustrated catalogue of the subject that has ever been published. " Those who have yet to learn what Chinese art of the best periods, in pottery, porcelain, painting and sculpture, really means may be envied this first introduction to the subject. "Without any special knowledge required _ there is something to gratify every kind of taste, for nobility of conception and purity and simplicity of form, in the earlier works, and for decorative richness and ingenuity of craftsmanship in the later, from the Ming period onward."

The collection comprises early Chinese tomb wares, from the third to the ninth century, A.D. —horses, camels, dancers and athletes in pottery; Sung potteries with lovely simple shapes and exquisito self-coloured glazes; Ming wares in glorious colours and rich patterns; 17th and 18th century porcelains, remarkable for technical perfection and delicacy of ornament; landscape and figure paintings on silk of the 12th and 13th centuries; later pictures on other materials; sculptures in stone and bronze, jewellery and ornaments.