Source: Radio New Zealand
Jim and Mary Barr, who are both retired art curators and writers, started collecting in the early 1970s buying works by young artists who were then relatively unknown, Mary Barr told RNZ’s Nine to Noon .
“It was a very different environment. Artwork, relatively speaking, was actually quite cheap. And that made an enormous difference to our level of ambition as to what it is that we could do.
“Because in those days, in the 70s, you could buy a [Colin] McCahon for a very modest amount of money, which struck us as just extraordinary.”
Jim and Mary Barr.
Supplied
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“The thing we wanted to have happen was that people would see the work. Because when you’ve got it at home, I mean hardly anyone sees it really. I mean we see it,” Jim Barr says.
Artists including Michael Parekowhai, Peter Peryer, Ronnie van Hout, Frances Uprichard, John Pule, John Reynolds and Peter Robinson are represented in the collection.
Marie Shannon Mary Barr relaxes 1986.
Collection of Dunedin Public Art Gallery
Dunedin Public Art Gallery director Cam McCracken says the gift was New Zealand’s most significant private collection of contemporary art.
They have formed close relationships with many of the artists they collect, Jim Barr says.
“That’s been the part that we’ve liked the most, being able to support them, being able to be their friends, being able to get into the studios, because the studio is just such a magic place.
“You go into the studio, and you see all this, well, you see the amazing work that they’re doing, but you also see their notice boards with all the postcards that they put up and things, it’s just like reading their minds.”
Ronnie van Hout Who do I think I am 1998. Enamel on canvas board
Collection of Dunedin Public Art Gallery
The Barrs have chosen works by “joint intuition” over the last 50 years, Mary Barr says.
“We see things, we look at an exhibition, and one of us says in a kind of casual way, ‘I really liked that’, whatever it was.
“And the other says, ‘me too’. And we sort of nod and then we’re there. We would never buy anything that both of us couldn’t do that sensing.”
Michael Parekōwhai Constitution Hill 2011. Bronze.
Collection of the Dunedin Public Art Gallery
The dollar value of the collection doesn’t represent the value of the work, Jim Barr says.
“As Mary was saying before, we could buy a McCahon. I mean, that was unbelievable.
“Peter McCleavey, I remember we walked into the gallery, and he had these works on paper, and they were just strewn on the floor, like about 30 of them. And by paying off over a year, we could own one. I mean, that was unbelievable.”
– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand
