The Dublin Airport Authority (DAA) has said that no decision has been made on the disposal of up to 54 valuable works of art that were funded by the Arts Council, and which have been removed from the walls of the Great Southern hotels.
Following concerns raised by the Labour party about the future of the paintings, the DAA, which is selling the hotels, said any decision on the sale or transfer of the paintings would need the approval of the Government and would be carried out in full consultation with the Arts Council.
It has also emerged that the location of some of a further 89 other paintings that were co-financed by the State are unknown at present and that some may have been sold in the 1990s along with the great Northern Hotel in Bundoran.
This took place without consultation with the Arts Council, which paid for half of the cost of the paintings under a scheme at the time.
In the 1960s and 1970s, the CIE group bought 143 paintings by emerging Irish artists as part of a programme sponsored by the Arts Council, which financed half of the purchase cost. The paintings include works by Gerard Dillon, Patrick Collins, Louis le Brocquy and Basil Blackshaw, and cost £14,466.71 at the time.
However, former arts minister and Labour TD Michael D Higgins has said the collection could now be worth up to €4 million.
He criticised the removal of the paintings and called for them to be kept in public hands.
"We now need to see a full list of the works involved, which should be offered to appropriate local or regional public collections unless they are not going to be restored to the hotels," he said.
"This philistine action makes a mockery of the earlier Dublin Airport Authority statements that the sale of the hotel group as a going concern was an option for the future. The gutting of the hotels in terms of their art collection makes its own statement on this." Yesterday a spokesman for the DAA said no decision had been made on the works of art in the possession of the authority, and said they were being valued by de Vere auctioneers at present.
He said the authority had in its possession only 54 of the works, and the majority of the remainder are likely to be in the hands of CIE, the former parent company of the Great Southern Group.
He said the authority would be working in full consultation with the Minister for Arts and the Arts Council on the future of the collection.
He added that under a Department of Finance directive, issued following the sale of Aer Lingus's art collection, no sale could be made without full consultation with the relevant Minister.
