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Design Review: Volume 4, Issue 2 (September-May 1951-52)

Canterbury through English Eyes

Canterbury through English Eyes

The following note appeared in Alphabet & Image, the best journal of its kind in England, under the caption Christchurch Victory.

Readers ofImage may recall that in No. 4 we published an editorial concerning the rejection by the Christchurch (New Zealand) City Council of a proposed gift, a painting by Frances Hodgkins, entitled The Pleasure Garden, to the Robert McDougall Gallery.

The gift was not rejected in the time-honoured manner, with regrets and so forth, but in an aggressive, I-know-what-I-like manner by the advisory committee to the Council.

We are happy to say that the subscribers who were responsible for buying the painting and offering it to the Gallery were by no means the forlorn citizens that art-lovers are often pictured in films and books. They started something. Their agitation has proved so effective that we were delighted to hear from one of our readers, Mr. A. C. Brassington, of Christchurch, that the Council has reconsidered its earlier decision and will now hang the picture.

Some of the Councillors' opinions make entertaining but saddening reasoning. Said Cr. Mabel Housid (sic): ‘I know I am not an artist, but I hesitate to say where I would put that!’ Very funny. Said one Councillor: ‘The rank and file of the public would wonder at our mentality if we put it up in that beautiful building in the Botanic Gardens!’ ‘Perhaps art changes from year to year,’ added the Mayor, trying to placate his more philistinian councillors. Only Cr. Mary McLean showed a reasonably civilized view. She was told, she said, that the picture had remarkable qualities in balance of colour and texture. The artist was world-famous, and this painting would be famous, too, for the thought and discussion on art it had provoked.

Full marks to Councillor McLean.

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