Tauranga Art Gallery - Toi Tauranga

A special thanks to Gallery supporters - 28 May 2010

Long time supporters and funders of Tauranga Art Gallery gathered at the gallery last night in a function designed to recognise their generosity and support. Gallery trustees, councillors, Mayors Stuart Crosby and Ross Paterson were among those present, along with corporate and private supporters of the gallery.

Gallery manager Penelope Jackson said that after two and a half years of the gallery being in operation, it was time to reflect on its successes and achievements and to acknowledge the financial and political support by philanthropic members of the community that had enabled the gallery to flourish.

“To date, we have had 19,000 school children visit the gallery on organised education programmes, we’ve showcased 58 exhibitions and over 140,000 visitors have viewed art in this building,” she said. “It is because people believed in the gallery, believed in the trustees and believed in art, that it happened.”

In his address, Chairman of the Board of Trustees, Graeme Horsley (image shown) said that contrary to what has been sensationalised in the media, the Gallery was financially secure. He stated that although the Gallery would register a financial deficit for the next three years, the majority of the deficit allowed for an annual depreciation of $98,000, which is a non-cash item.

He went on to state that the Gallery’s income projections reflected the fact that the Tauranga City Council had capped the Gallery’s operating funding at $847,000 and removed the inflation adjustor, comparing that to the $3.6 million grant received by Dunedin Art Gallery, and $2 million by New Plymouth’s Govett-Brewster Gallery, both cities having considerably less population than that of Tauranga.

“We are sourcing an increased level of sponsorships from local businesses,” said Horsley. “We are also the recipient of funding from bequests that is allowing us to consider some new and exciting exhibitions and to make small additions to our own gallery collection.”

The Gallery owns a collection of works by artists including Arthur Dagley, Susan Wilson, Nigel Brown and Edward Bullmore, as well as hosting exhibitions by these and other well-established national and international artists since it opened.

Two major coups for the Gallery will be the upcoming Reuben Paterson work in June, Whakapapa: get down upon your knees, fresh from the 6^th Australian Pacific Triennial in Brisbane, and the Frances Hodgkins’ Femme Du Monde exhibition from the Dunedin Public Art Gallery in July.

“These are exciting developments which will see us position the Tauranga Art Gallery amongst the leading regional galleries in New Zealand,” said Horsley.

“ A public art gallery is an integral part of a creative community. It is a place for inspiring creativity, generating optimism and public enlightenment, triggering curiosity, nurturing collective generous minds and dreaming beyond tomorrow.”