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Save the McDougall, Botanical Gardens, Christchurch (2026)

06/09/2026

Save the McDougall Campaign

The Robert McDougall Art Gallery in the Christchurch Botanic Gardens

Hello everyone,

Our petition continued to slowly move forward this week and has now reached 1409 with one local signatory commenting that they did not enjoy the art now being shown in the City Council’s facilities. This is a comment that has been made by quite a few petitioners. I presume they are people who have gone to the Christchurch Art Gallery expecting to see historical art works and have seen instead only contemporary art. It is a comment that has been made quite often by petitioners.

It is hardly surprising. I have been visiting the Christchurch Art Gallery since when Jenny Harper was appointed the Director in 2006 and later Blair Jackson in 2018. And during that time the gallery has displayed, in my view, ever increasingly extreme so called contemporary art exhibitions of the most weird objects such as a corrugated iron fence in darkness, chains hanging from the ceiling, a tree branch hanging from the ceiling of the glass entrance façade, people’s washing (clothes) hanging on lines and shopping lists written on long sheets of paper. I cannot belief that the majority of Christchurch’s art lovers can possibly consider such displays as being art of any form.

In recent times, I have regularly only seen around 30 conventional historical paintings on display - mainly landscapes. This is a tiny proportion of the city’s historical collection which consists of around 600 oil paintings and 300 watercolours valued at around $30m. Worse still is the fact that all the best historical works, some worth millions, are not on permanent display. This is outrageously disrespectful to the donors of these works and the city’s art lovers who want to see them regularly.

But that is not the end of the disrespect as the gallery itself was built with the help of private donors for the intended purpose of being able to show more of the city’s collection as the McDougall had become too small. It cost $35m to build and was badly damaged in the earthquakes and cost a further $50m to repair and was closed for 5 years! And after all that this beautiful new contemporary gallery is showing less of the city’s collection than before. And the Council who owns this building allows the management to carry on showing a totally unbalanced display of the city’s available art. Why the Council is allowing this is another story.

To show how bad the situation is I have recently discovered an artist whose wonderful paintings donated to the city have not been seen for probably over 25 years! The city’s collection holds five works by the artist Laurence William Wilson who is also represented in the collections of all the major galleries in New Zealand as well as the Hocken Library in Dunedin, the Alexander Turnbull Library in Wellington and Canterbury Museum. Wilson came to New Zealand in 1870 and lived in Christchurch until 1877 then briefly in Auckland before finally establishing himself as an artist in Dunedin in 1883. In the heyday of the New Zealand art market Wilson’s paintings were often fetching $20,000 - $30,000 at auction. Today it is more like only $3,000 - $4,000. The city holds five of his works – here are two:

West Coast Road near the Bealey 1905 oil on panel Laurence William Wilson (1851-1912) donated by David Langley 1964.

Preservation Inlet 1887 oil on panel Lawrence William Wilson (1851-1912) donated by Cyril and Jane Smith 2014

This is the reason why it is important before the McDougall reopens that the city’s art lovers, who were gifted this beautiful building, make their views well known to the Council and Museum staff by signing the petition.

The petition is available now for the Council and Museum to see and will be formally presented to them well before the gallery reopens.

If you wish to see the McDougall Art Gallery when it reopens used only for the historical art owned by the city as a whole it is imperative you sign my petition. The link is:

Save the McDougall as our Museum of Historical Art - Petitions.nz

Please send this posting on to all your Facebook friends and ask them to forward it onto their friends. In that way we can hopefully build the numbers up.

Thank you everyone for your support.

Tim Seay

Save the McDougall Campaign 6 September 2026

30/08/2026

Save the McDougall Campaign

The Robert McDougall Art Gallery in the Christchurch Botanic Gardens

Hello everyone,

Our petition has gained another two signatories this week to reach 1402 both making interesting comments. The first from Christchurch mentioned in passing that Robert McDougall gave the gallery in order to display his own art collection. While he did give the gallery three beautiful paintings, he purchased these locally. The reason he gave the city the gallery was because it wanted him to because it didn’t have a purpose built art gallery and the Council could not raise the necessary funds from the public to build one. This was despite the Canterbury Society of Arts and the Jamieson family offering to give their collections to the city if a suitable gallery was built. When the gallery opened in 1932 the main part of the original collection came from the Society of Arts.

Since then, the historical collection has been built up over the years by generous donors to around 600 oil paintings and 300 watercolours. A few have also been purchased with Council funding. In 2002 the collection was moved to the Christchurch Art Gallery in preparation for its opening in 2003 and the Council leased the McDougall Art Gallery to Canterbury Museum in 2003 for 50 years to be included in their redevelopment programme which did not begin until 2023 and is not due for completion until 2029! As a result, the McDougall which was not damaged in the 2011 earthquakes will not have been used properly as an art gallery for 27 years if it reopens in 2029. However, it would have had to have been closed for a period after the earthquakes to be earthquake strengthened and other work like all public buildings in Christchurch.

But it is worse than that for our art lovers because since Jenny Harper was appointed the Director of the new Christchurch Art Gallery in 2006 the Council has allowed its successive management over the years to mainly display contemporary art. It is now so bad that when ever I visit I can only count up around 30 historical works – a tiny proportion of the total art on display. And in recent times the contemporary displays have been so extreme that there is no way it can even be called art! The end result of this mismanagement is that there is now well over $60m of historical art that the gallery staff are purposely preventing the public from viewing. And this is approved by the Council. A scandalous situation that must come to an end.

In order to show the extent of this problem I have recently selected at random around five paintings from the Christchurch Art Gallery’s website that I just happen to like myself. The first one is yet another foundation painting from the Canterbury Society of Arts:

Near Burnham Beeches 1887 watercolour on board Octavius Rickatson (1856-1941) presented by Canterbury Society of Arts 1932

It was selected at the Royal Academy London by the then president of the Royal Academy Sir Fredric Leighton in 1887 with 3 other paintings purchased for 31 pounds 10 shillings on behalf of the Canterbury Society of Arts.

Beeches is the remains of a great primeval forest that once covered much of the county of Buckinghamshire. It lies a short distance to the west of London and became a public domain in 1880. At that time there was considerable concern about the rapid growth of London and its impact on the countryside. Art showing rural scenes became very popular and Octavius Rickatson produced many romantic rural works throughout his career. This painting shows Rickatson’s traditional watercolour approach. Requiring a great deal of skill, the composition is built up with carefully layered washes of colour. Near Burnham Beeches was exhibited at the 1887 Royal Academy Exhibition.

This particular painting has not been displayed to the public for so long I doubt anyone knows when it last was seen!

This is the reason why it is important before the McDougall reopens that the city’s art lovers, who were gifted this beautiful building, make their views well known to the Council and Museum staff by signing the petition.

The petition is available now for the Council and Museum to see and will be formally presented to them well before the gallery reopens.

If you wish to see the McDougall Art Gallery when it reopens used only for the historical art owned by the city as a whole it is imperative you sign my petition. The link is:

Save the McDougall as our Museum of Historical Art - Petitions.nz

Please send this posting on to all your Facebook friends and ask them to forward it onto their friends. In that way we can hopefully build the numbers up.

Thank you everyone for your support.

Tim Seay

Save the McDougall Campaign 30 August 2026

24/08/2026

Save the McDougall Campaign

The Robert McDougall Art Gallery in the Christchurch Botanic Gardens

Hello everyone,

I am sorry for the delay in my latest posting but I have been really badly affected by one of the local winter bugs this year and have ended up spending virtually a week in bed and I am still recovering. I hope not too many of you have succumbed to these bugs but a lot have.

In the meantime, our petition has finally hit 1400 and the latest signatories have made some wonderful comments which have really touched me. As I have said before it is your comments that keep me going and I only wish my grandfather was alive to be able to learn how much his gift has been appreciated by the city’s art lovers. One local said:

“I'm a lover of art and history and believe that the gallery should be used for its original purpose, which is to display a wide range of historic artworks and have the most important amongst them be permanently viewable”.

Another:

This amazing historical building was gifted to Christchurch by a citizen in perpetuity. This should not be removed by anyone.

This is what my Save the McDougall Campaign is all about – to save it for the use of the city’s art lovers to whom it was given because it has been unnecessarily leased to Canterbury Museum for 50 years under a rather vague lease agreement which could possibly allow them to use it to some extent for their own uses rather than those of the city’s art lovers to whom Robert McDougall gave the gallery. His intended use of the gallery was to be a public art gallery for the city to enable it to establish and display its own historical collection and also display visiting exhibitions from other available collections. If the Museum when it opens in 2029 uses it for this purpose it will have to draw upon all the city’s available historical works.

It is naturally also interested in showing works from its own art collections which they haven’t had the opportunity to display in public for years. Many of their works will probably need some restoration and preparatory work to prepare them for display in a public art gallery. At this stage we have estimated they may have up to 80 suitable works available that are of a public art gallery standard.

The gallery can display 300 historical works in one hang which means up to 200 historical works will have to come from the city’s collection at the Christchurch Art Gallery where there are a total of 600 oil paintings and 300 watercolours in the historical collection. The remaining small number could possibly come from private collections and also the other public galleries in Auckland, Te Papa and Dunedin but it is very difficult today to borrow art works from other public galleries so not many will be available.

As I have mentioned before the Museum’s deputy Director, Sarah Murray, has begun supervising their work on how they are going to run the gallery beginning with looking on their own collection and also discussing their borrowing of works from the Christchurch Art Gallery. I am pleased to be able to say that the initial discussions seem to have gone well and I am hoping I can before long have further discussions with her as her work progresses.

In the meantime, I have come across another of the city’s foundation paintings. These were the paintings which initially established the city’s art collection from gifts from the Canterbury Society of Arts to the McDougall Art Gallery when it opened in 1932. I had no idea this one existed.

Evening Glow 1919 oil on canvas Grace Butler (1886-1962)

purchased by and presented by the Canterbury Society of Arts 1932 for the opening of the McDougall Art Gallery. It is yet another beautiful painting in the city’s collection which has not been seen for 20 years. It was in the original hang when the Christchurch Art Gallery opened in 2003 and not seen since 2007. It is outrageous that the Council is allowing the staff at the Gallery to deny the viewing public access to so much of the city’s historical art. It is currently in storage.

Grace Butler was a New Zealand born artist who painted widely in the Canterbury mountains especially around Arthurs Pass.

This is the reason why it is important before the McDougall reopens that the city’s art lovers, who were gifted this beautiful building, make their views well known to the Council and Museum staff by signing the petition.

The petition is available now for the Council and Museum to see and will be formally presented to them well before the gallery reopens.

If you wish to see the McDougall Art Gallery when it reopens used only for the historical art owned by the city as a whole it is imperative you sign my petition. The link is:

Save the McDougall as our Museum of Historical Art - Petitions.nz

Please send this posting on to all your Facebook friends and ask them to forward it onto their friends. In that way we can hopefully build the numbers up.
Thank you everyone for your support.

Tim Seay

Save the McDougall Campaign 24 August 2026

10/08/2026

Save the McDougall Campaign

The Robert McDougall Art Gallery in the Christchurch Botanic Gardens

Hello everyone,

Our petition has crept up this week to 1395 with one petitioner saying they can remember how much they used to love the gallery as a child and asking how on earth did it ever become leased to the Museum? A good question and another story!

The news this week was an article in the Press on Friday 7 August discussing a report by the Taxpayers Union on the value of all the city’s publicly held art works which they estimated at $164m – the third highest in the country. This compares with the figure of $60m I have used for the historical collection currently held at the Christchurch Art Gallery. The Taxpayers Union have said in their report that the city’s ratepayers have unknowingly become the owners of the third largest collection in the country and have asked the question whether it has delivered back to them that dollar value of worth. The Director of the Gallery, Blair Jackson, in reply was quoted as saying most of the works have been donated by generous citizens and the value of the city’s art was beyond its financial value and instead is in its cultural, educational, social and economic benefits.

While most people would presumably agree with him, what he didn’t mention is that he and his staff show very little of the historical collection to the public and instead mostly extreme contemporary art. So, the ratepayers and the remaining viewing public are getting very little value from the city’s art because they can’t see it. It’s in storage! Really the arrogance of these people is beyond belief.

In case you are wondering how this could possibly happen I have already explained it is possible due to the way the Council have decided to run the Gallery. Very simply they have laid down certain guidelines in their Long Term Plan that the management has to meet in respect to how the collection is displayed but these do not necessarily relate to what type of art they end up displaying. For example, one is to do with showing art forms which cater for the different social segments of the city’s population. But they do not relate to the balance of art works as between contemporary art and historical art and Council will not interfere with what art the staff actually displays. This explains how it is possible for the most valuable historical works not to be on permanent display.

But hopefully this will all come to an end when the McDougall reopens. There will be no reason then why the best historical works can’t all go back to where they came from and be put on permanent display. There will be plenty of room available as it can display 300 historical works in one hang. And our petition has shown this is where our art lovers wish to see their historical art displayed.

And here is another of the best works from Canterbury Museum’s collection which they have earmarked to display in the McDougall when it opens. It is a watercolour as are many of the other works held by the Museum. Watercolours generally can only be displayed for six months at a time before being stored again in darkness which involves framing each time they are hung.

Akaroa Harbour seen from Barry’s Bay Nicholas Chevalier (1828-1902) water colour on paper mounted on board Canterbury Museum collection. Chevalier was born in St Petersburg Russia and painted widely in Australia and New Zealand. His works are held in a number of galleries in Australia.

The McDougall has now been leased to Canterbury Museum for 50 years under a lease agreement which does not specify that it should be used only to display the city’s historical art from all possible available sources. This lease agreement has dishonoured the terms of Robert McDougall’s 1928 gift of the gallery to the art loving citizens of Christchurch which was for the city’s own collection. What this means is that how it is used in future could depend to some extent on the views of the future Director and staff of the Museum. If they wish to go off at a tangent and start using it for Museum purposes rather than as an art gallery for the city, the Council is unlikely to stop them just as they have not stopped the staff at the Christchurch Art Gallery from only displaying contemporary art.

This is the reason why it is important before the McDougall reopens that the city’s art lovers, who were gifted this beautiful building, make their views well known to the Council and Museum staff by signing the petition.

If you wish to see the McDougall Art Gallery when it reopens used only for the historical art owned by the city as a whole it is imperative you sign my petition. The link is:

Save the McDougall as our Museum of Historical Art - Petitions.nz

Please send this posting on to all your Facebook friends and ask them to forward it onto their friends. In that way we can hopefully build the numbers up.

Thank you everyone for your support.

Tim Seay

Save the McDougall Campaign 10 August 2026

05/08/2026

Save the McDougall Campaign

The Robert McDougall Art Gallery in the Christchurch Botanic Gardens

Hello everyone,

I am sorry for the delay in my latest posting which is due to my having problems in logging into Facebook which I hope I have now solved with the help of a computer expert. Logging in has now become more difficult due to protections they have put in place to protect account holders.

Our petition this week has moved on very slowly to 1393 with signatories saying how they used to love the gallery and the beautiful paintings. It is sad that all these memories that people have are from so long ago. The gallery was in effect closed in 2002 when the city’s collection was transferred to the Christchurch Art Gallery in 2002 in preparation for its opening in 2003. It was then used by Canterbury Museum on occasions for a few inappropriate displays until the earthquakes in 2011 when it was closed to the public. It was not damaged in the quakes but had to be earthquake strengthened in accordance with the Council’s requirements for all public buildings. But it was then leased in 2021 to Canterbury Museum for 50 years and became included in the Museum’s redevelopment project which has delayed it’s reopening even more. The Museum project together with the Gallery is not due to be finished until 2029. The Gallery by then would have been unused to display art for 27 years – a whole generation!

However, the Council is spending $24.5m on it to earthquake strengthen it and provide base isolation and deepen the basement and other improvements.

The news this week was that the Council on Friday 24 July asked six local Members of Parliament to a meeting to encourage them to ask the Government to reconsider their request for them to meet the Council’s $15m pledge towards both the Cathedral and Museum projects which the Government decided against in their recent budget. After the meeting Councillor Sam MacDonald was quoted as saying he did not know whether he had persuaded any politicians to support additional funding for either project but as it was election year parties needed to consider what they could offer Christchurch voters. As far as the Museum project is concerned, we will probably have to wait until after the election before we receive another assessment of the financial state of the project including any further cost increases.

Having in my last posting talked about Robert McDougall’s biography I thought it might be interesting to mention a third painting that he gave the Gallery that I have always thought is of a very high standard. It is the End of the Chapter by George Paul Chalmers who was one of the most important Scottish artists of his time and painted many significant portraits. However, The End of the Chapter is intended as an allegory, representing the idea of a life lived rather than any specific individual. The elderly man is placed within a dark interior; light enters the scene and is reflected up from the book to illuminate the face of the reader. Chalmers expresses something existential through his use of chiaroscuro, the contrast of light and dark, which here provides a contemplative mood and suggests an intimate internal dialogue.

The McDougall has now been leased to Canterbury Museum for 50 years under a lease agreement which does not specify that it should be used only to display the city’s historical art from all possible available sources. This lease agreement has dishonoured the terms of Robert McDougall’s 1928 gift of the gallery to the art loving citizens of Christchurch which was for the city’s own collection. What this means is that how it is used in future could depend to some extent on the views of the future Director and staff of the Museum. If they wish to go off at a tangent and start using it for Museum purposes rather than as an art gallery for the city, the Council is unlikely to stop them just as they have not stopped the staff at the Christchurch Art Gallery from only displaying contemporary art.

This is the reason why it is important before the McDougall reopens that the city’s art lovers, who were gifted this beautiful building, make their views well known to the Council and Museum staff by signing the petition.

If you wish to see the McDougall Art Gallery when it reopens used only for the historical art owned by the city as a whole it is imperative you sign my petition. The link is:

Save the McDougall as our Museum of Historical Art - Petitions.nz

Please send this posting on to all your Facebook friends and ask them to forward it onto their friends. In that way we can hopefully build the numbers up.

Thank you everyone for your support.

Tim Seay

Save the McDougall Campaign 5 August 2026

30/07/2026

Save the McDougall Campaign

The Robert McDougall Art Gallery in the Christchurch Botanic Gardens

Hello everyone,

In 2019, I decided to commission author Jennifer Haworth to research and write a biography of the life of my maternal grandfather Robert Ewing McDougall (1860-1942). I never knew him as he died before I was born and the only memories I had of him was what my mother had told me. But the one thing that had always puzzled me a bit as I grew older was how quickly he seemed to have become forgotten by people when writing about the history of the city. And yet his contribution to the city through his business empire and his philanthropy which knew no bounds, for which he was never honoured, were probably second to none as Jenny Haworth discovered in her research. That is why we decided to call the book Forgotten Philanthropist.

The book is also an interesting history of Christchurch especially during the difficult years of the First World War and the Depression.

But there is one story in the book which I believe tells us exactly what sort of a man he really was. During his life time the art gallery building had no name on it at all and it wasn’t until the 1990’s that the Council put the words Roberrt McDougall Art Gallery above the front door. Having no name had caused problems as visitors to the Museum and the Gardens on their way out would come up to the front door wondering what the building was and whether to go in and often would not go in and walk out to Rolleston Avenue. Eventually the staff had to get the Council to put its name on the gallery. Back in 1925 it had been the suggestion of the Governor General Charles Fergusson that a new art gallery for Christchurch should be named after anyone who would provide the major funding for it. As a result, it was always referred to as the Robert McDougall Art Gallery but when it was completed and opened in 1932 no name was put on it. My grandfather never asked the Council to put its name above the front door.

Copies of the book can be obtained from:
Nationwide Book Distributors
351 Kiri Kiri Road,
Oxford
Canterbury 7495

Nationwide Books [email protected]

Phone: 03 312 1603

Robert Ewing McDougall 1932 oil on canvas Archibald Nicoll (1886- 1953)
Presented to the Robert McDougall Art Gallery 1933

We still have a few books available for people who are interested at Nationwide Book Distributors.

I hope you enjoy it.

Tim Seay

Save the McDougall Campaign 30 July 2026

26/07/2026

Save the McDougall Campaign

The Robert McDougall Art Gallery in the Christchurch Botanic Gardens
Hello everyone,

Our petition has slowed up this week with only one signatory from Christchurch saying he was signing so people will be able when the McDougall opens to see the city’s historical art which is currently in storage. It is currently held in storage at the Christchurch Art Gallery but not displayed to the public – 600 oil paintings and 300 watercolours worth around $30m! I hope the petition will pick up again next week!

The news this week has been the two articles in the Press on Wednesday and Friday by Tina Law concerning funding for the Cathedral in which she said the Council had invited local Members of Parliament to a meeting to discuss funding for the Cathedral and Museum projects. It seems the Council is holding firm on the condition of its offers of future funding for both projects being conditional on the Government providing a similar amount and is asking the MP’s to put pressure on the Government to provide the funding requested. The Council is hoping that the Government will come to the party as it is election year. So it now seems we will have to wait until nearer the election before we know the final outcome. If the Government does not provide further funding both projects will be in trouble. In the meantime, there is also the possibility that the cost of the Museum project will escalate further over the next 3 years due to the Iran War which has now flared up again.

It is interesting now to look at Canterbury Museum’s own art collection and what works they will wish to display in the first hang when the McDougall opens. The Museum have a large collection of art that has been left to them over the years but they have never really been in a position to be able to display it fully in a public art gallery. They did for many years have 50 of their best oil paintings held for display at the McDougall but these were returned when Anthony Wright became the Museum Director in 1996. Since then to my knowledge their art has not really ever been on public display. The Museum Redevelopment will give them the opportunity to do this but not all of their works are of a public art gallery standard and some of it requires conservation work which they have never really been able to carry out because of the cost. They are apparently carrying out some of this work at the moment on certain works while their collection is in storage at Hornby. Most of the collection is actually watercolours and because they can only be displayed for 6 months at a time it is unlikely they will be able to meet the cost of having to frame these each time they are displayed.

In the meantime, Sarah Murray, their Deputy Director, has provided me with a list of the first 10 paintings they have chosen for the first proposed hang. Here is the first one:

Rapaki 1877 oil on canvas John Gibb

The Museum have several John Gibb paintings amongst their oil paintings which will become a wonderful addition to the city’s historical collection and, in that respect, it should be seen as an advantage of the McDougall becoming part of the Museum’s redevelopment. It should be hoped they can get as many of their works of a public art gallery standard in future as possible ready for display in the McDougall.

The McDougall has now been leased to Canterbury Museum for 50 years under a lease agreement which does not specify that it should be used only to display the city’s historical art from all possible available sources. This lease agreement has dishonoured the terms of Robert McDougall’s 1928 gift of the gallery to the art loving citizens of Christchurch which was for the city’s own collection. What this means is that how it is used in future could depend to some extent on the views of the future Director and staff of the Museum. If they wish to go off at a tangent and start using it for Museum purposes rather than as an art gallery for the city, the Council is unlikely to stop them just as they have not stopped the staff at the Christchurch Art Gallery from only displaying contemporary art.

This is the reason why it is important before the McDougall reopens that the city’s art lovers, who were gifted this beautiful building, make their views well known to the Council and Museum staff by signing the petition.

If you wish to see the McDougall Art Gallery when it reopens used only for the historical art owned by the city as a whole it is imperative you sign my petition. The link is:

Save the McDougall as our Museum of Historical Art - Petitions.nz

Please send this posting on to all your Facebook friends and ask them to forward it onto their friends. In that way we can hopefully build the numbers up.

Thank you everyone for your support.

Tim Seay

Save the McDougall Campaign 26 July 2026

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