Sour Grapes as Standard Equipment?

[copake_ham]

Why is it automatically assumed that the museum used taxpayer funds to purchase this work?

I don't know the ownership structure in Oz, but here in the U.S. most museums are run by private, not-for-profit organizations. They raise funds from a variety of sources including contributions, "suggested" admission fees, donations of art works and usually some small fraction of public monies.

Further, most well-established museums regularly rotate their collections through deascessions(?(i.e. sales of works no longer considered important to the collection) and ascessions with the former funding much of the purchase of the latter.

And so what if public money was used to acquire this work? It means that the public acquired an asset which should rise in value over time and even permit, through its eventual deascession(?), the procurement of other work(s).

[Roger Hicks]

The argument you make is true, but could be applied to all museum purchases...

Well, I did say that there were other valid arguments, and you've made them eloquently. My only real point was that most people don't think about the policies behind arts spending. Some decry it all as bad (the philistine/Nazi view of 'the government wasting our money'). Others, it seems, see no need for any debate on the idea of a committee spending a million dollars of someone else's money, as long as it's a photograph (how would some of them reacted had it been digi?).

Cheers,

R.

[jstraw]

Why is it automatically assumed that the museum used taxpayer funds to purchase this work?

I don't know the ownership structure in Oz, but here in the U.S. most museums are run by private, not-for-profit organizations. They raise funds from a variety of sources including contributions, "suggested" admission fees, donations of art works and usually some small fraction of public monies.

Further, most well-established museums regularly rotate their collections through deascessions(?(i.e. sales of works no longer considered important to the collection) and ascessions with the former funding much of the purchase of the latter.

And so what if public money was used to acquire this work? It means that the public acquired an asset which should rise in value over time and even permit, through its eventual deascession(?), the procurement of other work(s).

These are good points.

[gr82bart]

Hey! What do you know? I can use the salad bowl to eat popcorn from AND count beans.

Regards, Art.

[jd callow]

My only real point was that most people don't think about the policies behind arts spending.

how would some of them reacted had it been digi?

Assuming the money was public money (good point George), and a large portion of the populace was oblivious, is it the fault of the museum or should the populace wake up and see where their money is going?

I don't confuse the purpose of this site with the greater world around us. I suspect and hope others here do the same. If the image in question was digital it would not be posted here (for long).

I want all museums and public institutions that deal in the arts to be well funded and generous with their assistance. This would include stone carvings through digital creations, as it is they are not. I, as with most, can only supply a limited focus to what they are doing, I need to be able to trust them and, in this instance, I think they have done well.

[Roger Hicks]

I don't confuse the purpose of this site with the greater world around us. I suspect and hope others here can do the same.

Optimist!

The rest of your post is, however, well taken.

Cheers,

R.

[Mick Fagan]

Well I decided to do some digging around regarding just how the money for this $1,000,000 photograph came to be in the purse of my local government gallery, National Gallery of Victoria (NGV).

It appears that the gallery had wished to purchase a Wall work for some time. There is one other in the country at the Art Gallery of Western Australia. NGV deputy director Tony Ellwood said the gallery bought Untangling with money from the NGV Foundation while Wall's prices were still affordable.

I chased around to find out about this, "NGV Foundation", apparently it is made up of various organisations and individuals who donate, or bequests to the Gallery.

The source of this information comes from the original newspaper article from last December.

http://www.ngv.vic.gov.au/ngvfoundation/

The above link will take anyone to the NGV Foundation home page.

It appears that my money hasn't been used after all, doesn't change my view of the picture though.

Interestingly, every painting, piece of pottery or whatever in the gallery, if it has been purchased from one of the three parts of the NGV Foundation, always has this information on the description attached to, or near the piece of work being shown. This picture doesn't have this information at all, which is why I thought it had been purchased outright by the gallery.

Mick.