THE COLLECTION of contemporary art owned by Anglo Irish Bank should be opened up to the public, who are now its ultimate owners, the Labour Party has said. Labour arts spokeswoman Mary Upton said the bank’s collection was hung, for the most part, in its corporate headquarters on St Stephen’s Green, Dublin.
“Anglo Irish Bank was a significant patron of the arts when money was no object and, in the years before it collapsed, amassed a significant collection of contemporary art,” she said. “Shamefully, however, there is virtually no public access to the building, which means the people who ultimately own the works of art, the people of Ireland, can never actually get to see them.”
The collection includes work by Tony O’Malley, Stephen McKenna and Mark Francis. Ms Upton said the collection should be fully accessible to the public, and the pieces should be made available to publicly-funded galleries.
Her party colleague Ruairí Quinn tabled a Dáil question on the matter last week.
But Minister for Finance Brian Lenihan said there was no provision for such a move in last year’s bank guarantee legislation, under which Anglo was taken into State ownership. He said the management of assets of the bank, including art works, was a matter for the board of the bank.
Ms Upton said the Minister, in his reply, had “abdicated any responsibility” for the matter.
Anglo Irish Bank associate director and board member Anne O'Donoghue told The Irish Timeslast year that collecting art, for the bank, "fits with our corporate-responsibility programme". She said the bank had bought "wisely and well".