Sunday, August 6, 2023

The JMW Turner art bequest and his legacy at the Tate and the National Gallery

I noticed an interesting article in The Daily Telegraph on the JMW Turner bequest.

In short, the family are complaining that the Tate and the National Gallery haven't complied with his wishes to have his work of 300 paintings and 30,000 sketches in a single repository. Many works are now either in storage or on loan.

I think this is an unfair criticism.

Firstly, I don't think there would be enough space to house all his works in some building on permanent display; and an art gallery shouldn't be an ASDA. Secondly, I think the job of a gallery is to rotate different works of art around different motif and discussions. There should be a rotation with some works being loaned out occasionally to other galleries around the world or going into archives to be refreshed later.

I think the Tate Britain does a great job managing his vast legacy.

I took the below photo at the end of July.

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