Bolton confirms 36 paintings to be sold
Rebecca Atkinson, 04.03.2011
List includes two Picassos and three paintings from museum's display
Bolton Council has confirmed plans to sell 36 paintings at auction later this year.
The council originally intended to select 41 works for disposal, but four have now been removed from the list because further research found they had significant connections to Bolton. A further work – A Proposal by Thomas Rowlandson – was removed after experts discovered it was a copy.
Three paintings up for disposal (Sea Gulls and Sapphire Seas by Robert Gemmell Hutchison, A Norfolk Landscape by John Berney Ladbrooke, and The Somnambulist by John Everett Millais) were on display in the museum but have now been removed and put into storage. All the other works were already in storage.
Click here for a full list of works to be auctioned (word)
Other works the council will sell include: Pauline de Talleyrand-Perigord by Walter Sickert; Portrait of Mary Sartoris by Frederic Leighton; and Peintre et Modele and Le Picador, an etching and a lithograph by Pablo Picasso.
The council hopes to raise £500,000 from the auction and the money will be used to fund a new storage facility for the museum. A spokeswoman for the museum said it was not yet in a position to announce which auction house the works will go through, but added the sale is likely to happen this summer.
Elaine Sherrington, Bolton Council’s executive member for adult and community services, said: “Initially, the proposal was for 41 items to be sold and the intention was to exclude those from current exhibitions and items from the core collections: Egyptology, postwar 20th century British art and items which document Bolton’s history. We also stipulated that none of the items proposed for sale were to have been donated to the council or bought using grants and other external funding.”
Sherrington added that the paintings on display in the museum fall outside of its core collection and are wholly owned by Bolton Council.
The council’s executive committee voted in December last year to dispose of the works before entering into a tendering process for auction houses. However, the Museums Association’s ethics committee has previously raised concerns with the council about the lack of public consultation.
The next ethics committee meeting is on 14 March and Bolton Council's disposal is a major item on its agenda.
Click here for Maurice Davies on the sale for Radio 4's Front Row
The council originally intended to select 41 works for disposal, but four have now been removed from the list because further research found they had significant connections to Bolton. A further work – A Proposal by Thomas Rowlandson – was removed after experts discovered it was a copy.
Three paintings up for disposal (Sea Gulls and Sapphire Seas by Robert Gemmell Hutchison, A Norfolk Landscape by John Berney Ladbrooke, and The Somnambulist by John Everett Millais) were on display in the museum but have now been removed and put into storage. All the other works were already in storage.
Click here for a full list of works to be auctioned (word)
Other works the council will sell include: Pauline de Talleyrand-Perigord by Walter Sickert; Portrait of Mary Sartoris by Frederic Leighton; and Peintre et Modele and Le Picador, an etching and a lithograph by Pablo Picasso.
The council hopes to raise £500,000 from the auction and the money will be used to fund a new storage facility for the museum. A spokeswoman for the museum said it was not yet in a position to announce which auction house the works will go through, but added the sale is likely to happen this summer.
Elaine Sherrington, Bolton Council’s executive member for adult and community services, said: “Initially, the proposal was for 41 items to be sold and the intention was to exclude those from current exhibitions and items from the core collections: Egyptology, postwar 20th century British art and items which document Bolton’s history. We also stipulated that none of the items proposed for sale were to have been donated to the council or bought using grants and other external funding.”
Sherrington added that the paintings on display in the museum fall outside of its core collection and are wholly owned by Bolton Council.
The council’s executive committee voted in December last year to dispose of the works before entering into a tendering process for auction houses. However, the Museums Association’s ethics committee has previously raised concerns with the council about the lack of public consultation.
The next ethics committee meeting is on 14 March and Bolton Council's disposal is a major item on its agenda.
Click here for Maurice Davies on the sale for Radio 4's Front Row
Comments
MA Member
MA Member
- Was an auctioneer involved in selecting the works?
- Is that auctioneer connected to any member of Bolton Council staff?
- Why were staff not involved until after the 41 shortlist was drawn up?
- Where has the "core collection" concept come from? It's not in the A&D policy.
- Why was no public consultation done?
- Why was the list kept secret?
- Why was "commercial sensitivity" listed as an issue when publicity creates demand?
- Why did Bolton council staff lie and claim no on-display works would be included when they knew four pieces were on display at the time?
- What was the intellectual rationale for the list?
- Why was the historical significance not considered until after the list was drawn up?
- Was it purely driven by ease of sale?
- Is the money raised ring-fenced for collections work only?
- Why have other "non-Core" collections such as natural history, decorative art, ethnography, and non-British, non-Egyptian archaeology been considered?