Examination of Witnesses (Questions 20
- 39)
TUESDAY 10 OCTOBER 2006
BRITISH MUSEUM,
NATIONAL GALLERY,
V&A
Chairman: I would like to welcome our
next witnesses: Mr Neil MacGregor, Director of the British Museum,
Dr Charles Saumarez Smith, Director of the National Gallery, and
Mark Jones, Director of the V&A, and invite Philip Davies
to begin.
Q20 Philip Davies: Following the
DCMS consultation paper Understanding the Future, shortly
they are going to publish a document sitting out their priorities.
What would you like to see as their priorities in that document?
Mr MacGregor: I think I would
like to see added there the need to conserve and research the
collections, so that the collections can really play the role
across the whole of the United Kingdom that they should. In the
national collections we have a resource that educationally could
transform the UK. That is not adequately set out in the document;
nor is the very large, very serious problem that we do not have
a UK cultural organisation. The British Museum, the National Gallery,
the Victoria and Albert Museum are the museums of the whole United
Kingdom; we are the collection of every city, but as a result
of devolution there is now no body, no organism, to construct
a nationwide policy so that these collections can properly be
deployed. I think we all suffer greatly under that. Thirdly, I
would like to see more clearly stated the need to have a coherent
UK policy of the museums and in the cultural sector internationally,
because, again because of devolution, we have no single UK voice
to shape UK policy, which means that the collections of London—which
are unique in the world, as allowing an overview of the entire
history of the world, natural and manmade—cannot play the
role internationally that they should because we do not have the
structures in England. I would like to see that all set out in
the paper.
Q21 Adam Price: Surely there are
in place mechanisms of cooperation and collaboration with your
sister institutions in the nations in Wales, Scotland, Northern
Ireland.
Mr MacGregor: The problem is not
relationships between institutions. In the British Museum we lend
regularly to Wales, Northern Ireland and Scotland, and we have
long-term loans of touring exhibitions. The problem is how that
is going to be funded for the future because the DCMS is only
an English body. The Arts Council, which used to produce the support
for these kinds of tours, no longer supports tours beyond England.
If we want the collections to be shared across the UK, then either
DCMS must commit to funding that as a key part or we need some
kind of conversation at a structural official level to ensure
it happens.
Q22 Philip Davies: How effective
do you rate the DCMS in promoting and supporting national museums?
Mr MacGregor: I think they do
a very good job in supporting the national museums and promoting
them. My concern is a structural one: that we are absolutely central
education providers for the whole country. If you take something
particularly close to the British Museum's heart, the study of
ancient Egypt or Ancient China, these are topics that are taught
in schools, could be taught more in schools. They depend on the
museums. The failure to have a proper structural relationship
with the Department for Education is, I think, a very serious
one—just as, in the international arena, the failure to
have a structural relationship with the Foreign and Commonwealth
Office and DFID is serious.
Mr Jones: We would like to see
recognition that different museums make different but important
contributions in the public interest. For example, the V&A
was funded as a result of a recommendation of a Select Committee
of the House of Commons because there was concern about the quality
of design in this country. A school of design was set up with
the museum from which creative designers could work. We feel that
mission is extremely relevant today, because creative design continues
to be very important to the economy and the V&A is widely
recognised as being a very important resource to the creative
industries. In fact, 30% of our visitors are from practitioners
of art and design or teachers of art and design or students of
art and design. We know that the V&A, in common with other
museums, does other things which are important. Seven out of the
10 top tourist attractions in this country are national museums,
but we sometimes feel that that is not really recognised in the
development of tourism strategies. We know museums make a big
contribution in education. Nearly half a million people take part
in educational activities in the V&A. We know that they contribute
to social cohesion. The opening of the new Islamic Gallery at
the V&A, for example, has been symbolically important in saying,
"Yes, Islamic culture and industry are important to us collectively."
We know that museums are effective in representing Britain internationally,
in China and India, and indeed in other parts of the world, North
America and Europe. It is not that the contributions are not recognised,
but that it is sometimes frustratingly difficult to get the sustained
support that is needed to ensure that these things go on being
successful.
Q23 Philip Davies: What sort of support
is it that you look for that you do not get?
Mr Jones: I think the most important
thing is our core funding needs. In particular, it is very important
to recognise that museums, like many other organisations in the
public sector, face inflation, not at CPI, but at the level of
the average earnings index and the level of the building price
index, because we spend our money on employing people and maintaining
large, old and complex Grade I buildings, so, whether we like
it or not, our commitments rise in line with those indices. If
our funding falls in real terms—and it has done in the past—then
our ability to be effective falls.
Q24 Adam Price: Continuing on the
theme of money, which I am sure will be central to our inquiry,
all of the institutions represented here have been very successful
at generating income from additional sources through a variety
of means (sponsorship, and such like) but the V&A, in its
evidence, says that it is "disheartening" that success
in generating these forms of income does not appear to be rewarded
in terms of core funding. How could DCMS reward rather than penalise
museums which are successful at generating additional funding?
Mr Jones: I do not think DCMS
penalises success but I think it is difficult to see at the moment
any very direct relation between individual museum's achievements
and their funding. The reintroduction of free admission was a
huge success, and that has greatly increased visitor numbers,
but there have been many other successes. If you look at all the
performance indicators that apply to the national museums, you
will see that child visitors are up, educational use is up, the
use of museums by black and minority ethnic groups is up, but
there is a pattern of achievement there which does not seem to
elicit the kind of additional resources that you would hope for—because,
of course, more use/more visits entails more expense. You do need
to employ people to sustain the additional activity.
Q25 Adam Price: Perhaps you could
give us a more tangible sense of the financial situation you are
in. In your evidence, you referred to the problem of building
maintenance: for instance, your own Building Strategy Committee
recommended an annual spend of £3 million, whereas you have
only been able to allocate a tiny fraction of that, £135,000.
Long-term, this is not sustainable. Is that the point you are
making?
Mr Jones: I think the situation
with funding is that museums like the V&A, but also the National
Gallery and the British Museum, faced quite a poor funding situation
in the period from 1997 through to 2005-06. The current triennium
is much better. The settlement for last year, this year and next
year is perfectly adequate. We are very worried that the prospect
of a tough comprehensive spending review is going to result in
further cuts in real terms. I fear, as a result of that, not only
will the level of activity will be reduced but our proven ability
to attract donations and sponsorship and to raise money, both
from grants and from commercial income, will also be affected
by a decline in activity.
Mr MacGregor: It has become very
obvious in the last few years what an extraordinary national resource
these collections are, if they can be made available to the whole
country. That means having the staff to conserve them, to present
them, to study them, to look after them and then to accompany
them. There is not much point in having a Renaissance in the
Regions programme if the key national collections are not
in a position to lend more energetically to share that experience.
The kind of resources required not just for the physical sharing
of the collections but for the electronic sharing of them, through
creating websites for schools or whatever, is the kind of investment
we would like to see and which has not been adequately taken account
of by DCMS to date.
Q26 Adam Price: Your central point
is the need of a basic level of course funding as the foundation
upon which you are then able to generate the additional resources.
Mr MacGregor: Absolutely. These
skills of knowing about the collection in every sense can be acquired
only by people employed for some length of time, so there need
to be core staff with core funding.
Q27 Helen Southworth: You have touched
on the area I wanted to delve into further in the V&A evidence.
You have increased your user numbers to 14.7 million, and website
access was 11.6 million. That is a huge access step there. I wonder
whether we could explore a little more what your hopes are for
that area, particularly having access not just geographically/physically
across the whole country but in terms of the people who can access
it. Museums have suffered a great deal from being considered to
be places that wealthy people go to, rather than as places for
everybody. I think it is very difficult to justify extended expenditure
on museums if they are not accessible to people and if they are
generationally not accessible to people. Could you explore a bit
more about the individual technologies.
Mr Jones: Yes. I think it is hugely
exciting. What you say is true. It is not true only of the V&A.
This year there were 15 million visits to the V&A website.
This means the V&A is really working effectively, that is
educationally and doing research, right the way across this country
and also internationally. As many as 40% of those visits will
be from overseas, and that is important as well, it seems to me.
We would say that the pattern of use of the museum is not quite
as skewed towards the well-off as you might suggest, partly because
our touring exhibitions—which do visit every part of the
country—are very well patronised. There were one million
visits to the V&A touring exhibitions last year—and
that is really in every part of the country. I think you are completely
correct that all the national museums have a huge opportunity,
through putting their collections on-line, to become collectively
an unrivalled educational resource for everyone.
Mr MacGregor: If I may pick up
the point about general access, I think our experience is that
there is very wide use from all parts of the population. Certainly
the recent Bengali festival we held in the British Museum, Durga:
Building the Image of the Goddess, brought huge numbers of Bengalis,
from the whole country, both Hindu and Muslim, into the museum.
This is another reason why core funding is so important to understand
because the role of the museums in allowing different parts of
the community in the United Kingdom to see how they fit together
is a role that very few other public institutions can play. I
think it is being played and must be developed. The British Museum's
website figures are certainly comparable with those that Mark
Jones gave for the V&A. I would like to add to that, that
if you take sites like the British Museum's Ancient Civilisation
website particularly, these are used across the whole world not
just in the United Kingdom. We are in discussion with BBC World
Service to see how we can work together with them to make these
collections and the understanding of the world that they offer
available to everybody, because that is an extraordinary resource
that this country has which exists in no other country. The combination
of web for broadcasting, in every sense, particularly working
for organisations like the BBC, must be one of the ways in which
we move forward and for which we should be given funding.
Q28 Helen Southworth: The national
museums deal with disadvantaged communities like, for example,
looked-after children. What are your hopes for developing that?
Mr Saumarez Smith: Could I answer
that question because I think it is a very significant thing in
relation to the anxieties about the next comprehensive spending
round? As has been described, we have very high fixed costs in
terms of salary costs and building costs, both of which are increasing
[costs] with the rate of inflation. Therefore, the danger is that
you hit the areas which in some ways this Government has developed
very successfully in terms of programmes for non-traditional users
and disadvantaged children. The National Gallery, like the other
national museums, has been very active in that area, but, inevitably,
if you face the prospect of cuts, the danger is that you look
at those sorts of programmes because they are subject to new funding
and new funding is easier to turn off than your baseline funding.
I personally think that is a source of great anxiety.
Mr MacGregor: These initiatives
are expensive because they have to be tailored to particular communities
in rather small numbers. Certainly the project which the British
Museum ran, touring the throne made of weapons decommissioned
after the Mozambique Civil War to places like Pentonville Prison,
was extraordinarily successful but such projects are expensive
to do and that is something that needs to be taken account of.
We all do these projects and want to do them but they are labour
intensive and staff intensive.
Mr Jones: The V&A has been
involved in a programme called Image and Identity with
a number of partners, including Manchester, Birmingham, Brighton,
Sheffield and Tyne and Wear, and while relatively small numbers
of people can take part the impact seems to be extremely large
on those who do take part, so I think it is enormously worthwhile.
Q29 Chairman: You referred to the
success of the policy of free admission, which has obviously substantially
increased the number of visitors but at the same time inevitably
we have been talking about the problems of funding. Would any
of you like, if you were allowed to do so, to reintroduce charging
for admissions?
Mr Jones: No.
Mr Saumarez Smith: No. The V&A
obviously had admission charges. I think there is a great deal
of evidence from the period where some of the national museums
did have compulsory charges that it was inefficient in terms of
public subsidy. It dramatically reduced the numbers of people
who came to the institutions—and of course that also reduces
the amount of money you make privately. All the statistics I have
seen, with the possible exception of the Imperial War Museum,
suggest that it is a more efficient use of public subsidy to have
free admission[s]. I think that is now reasonably well recognised
in this country. Indeed, I know in Scandinavia they are introducing
it, following our example. People assume that America is committed
to charging, but one forgets that a lot of these big municipal
institutions introduce free admissions for exactly the same reasons.
Minneapolis has free admission[s]. It is not only a British idea.
Mr MacGregor: The real advantage
is that it allows museums to play a role in society that otherwise
they cannot. I was in Berlin yesterday with the directors of the
Louvre, the Berlin museums and the Hermitage in St Petersburg,
to talk about how we can use our Islamic collections to engage
our Islamic populations, which to each of those is an important
question. They were particularly interested in the way in which
the exhibition Word Into Art: Artists of the Modern
Middle East at the British Museum this summer has attracted
enormous numbers overall but also very large numbers of Muslims
of Middle Eastern and other backgrounds. The three other directors
reluctantly said they could not do anything like that in their
cities because the charging regimes would keep out the very people
we have been able to address. If we are talking about a wider
social role for museums and galleries, that is possible to achieve
only on the basis of free entry.
Q30 Chairman: You presumably did
not persuade the other three they should adopt the policy of free
entry.
Mr MacGregor: Of course Berlin
was free, on the British model, until very recently; until such
federal pressure on finance came that they had to change. As you
know, the City of Paris has moved to free admission and has seen
its attendances enormously increase along with the social mix
of its visitors. I do not think anybody in Continental Europe
would doubt the British model is the preferable one. As Charles
Suamarez Smith just said, some are now moving towards it.
Q31 Chairman: You will be aware there
is considerable concern and dismay at the prospect of the closure
of the Theatre Museum. When I last met Tony Hall, a couple of
months ago, he was expressing optimism, that it appeared that
a solution that could satisfy everyone had been found.
Mr Jones: I think three things
went wrong. The first was that the board of the Royal Opera House
began to feel increasingly cautious about the public spending
climate and they became worried about taking on a big new commitment.
I think the decision of the Society of London Theatres not to
take part—they having indicated that they were minded to
take part and that they would contribute both a member of the
management committee and also financially—was quite influential.
The third thing was that, despite the efforts of well-known figures
in the theatre world, it had not been possible to secure any pledges
at all towards the cost of the new partnership. Those were the
three things that changed the situation. We regret it. I think
that partnership had a lot of potential. We were excited about
that new approach because it would have enabled us to tackle the
obvious inadequacies of the premises. The history of the thing,
as you know, is that for a long time people have recognised that
those basement premises in Covent Garden cannot work as a museum
unless there is substantial investment to fit them for their public
purpose. The fact that the HLF turned down first a large bid to
reconstruct the museum and then a smaller bid to increase its
educational facilities and to re-display its collections meant
that the board of the V&A could really see no way in which
that museum could be made fit for purpose. A new educational facility
run jointly with the Royal Opera House would have been a very
good alternative.
Q32 Chairman: It was not possible
to salvage anything, to maintain at least some exhibition or display
or educational facility in "Theatreland" rather than
have it transferred to South Kensington.
Mr Jones: I think the Board of
the V&A are looking at not only a transfer of the displays
to South Kensington but also a wider approach to use the theatre
collections better. They are committed to a much stronger programme
of touring exhibitions drawn from the collections, to exploring
other partnerships—and there are, I think, other partnerships
possible—to really improving access to the Theatre collections
at Blythe House in Olympia. I think it is not just a question
of retrenchment to South Kensington; it is a question of trying
to use the resources in a way which I hope will mean more people
will get something out of the theatre collections than is possible
at the moment.
Q33 Chairman: How do you answer the
charge that the V&A has regarded the Theatre Museum as a poor
relation in the portfolio and that it has not had the protection
or the priority attached to it that has been given to things like
the Islamic galleries or the ceramic department?
Mr Jones: I would say that, if
you look at the facts, the proportion of the V&A's overall
budget that has gone to the Theatre Museum has not declined. In
fact, if anything, it has increased. The difference between the
Islamic galleries, and, indeed, the ceramic galleries, and the
Theatre Museum is that, despite our best efforts, whilst it has
been possible to raise large sums in terms of donations for the
Islamic galleries and the ceramic galleries, it has never proved
possible to raise substantial sums for the Theatre Museum. I am
afraid that one of the reasons for that, and the donors have told
us this, is that the potential major donors do not believe that
those premises are capable of making a really good museum.
Q34 Chairman: It seems extraordinary
that you have managed to achieve private support for the Islamic
galleries and the ceramic galleries, and yet, on the other hand,
for theatre, which is identified with the capital, which attracts
thousands of people to London every year and is successful, you
have not been able to achieve any private support.
Mr Jones: Yes, I agree. It is
extremely disappointing but it is not only our experience. As
I said, the Royal Opera House, when they conducted their own fund
raising trawl, had exactly the same experience.
Q35 Chairman: Your plans now for
the future? It has been said that the collection will be placed
in storage for two or three years, and then, even when it does
go on display, the amount of space dedicated to it will be reduced
from what there is at present.
Mr Jones: It will take several
years before the new display is finished. That is perfectly true.
But we hope to create a much better programme of exhibitions.
We are committed now to a major exhibition, Diaghilev's Ballet
Russes, which we believe will be enormously popular and will tour
both nationally and internationally. We think, as I say, that
there are possibilities of a partnership elsewhere which will
ensure the theatre collections are seen not only in London but
also in other places as well. If you are saying "am I completely
satisfied with the situation?" the answer is: "Well,
no I am not." If the funding were available, there would
be a very strong argument for creating a better museum, and probably
in the heart of London's Theatreland. I would be only too delighted
if the Government or the private sector were able to come up with
the funding that would enable us to do that.
Q36 Chairman: Do you accept that
you have quite a task ahead to restore the confidence of theatre
lovers in the capability of the V&A to look after this collection?
Mr Jones: The response of the
theatre community has actually been quite mixed. I have had a
number of people writing to me saying how deeply disappointed
they are about the closure of the museum, but I have also had
a number of people writing to me saying that they never thought
it was any use anyway and they are delighted we are now taking
a different course. I hope that we will be able to demonstrate
to people that we care a great deal about the theatre collections,
that we regard them as very important to the cultural life of
the country, and that we do want to use them to the best of our
ability.
Q37 Mr Sanders: Can I ask the Director
of the National Gallery, what is the current size of the Getty
bequest, and what is the history of its use in addressing the
difficulty faced in acquiring major masterpieces?
Dr Smith: Of course, in a way,
Neil MacGregor is as well suited to answer this question as I
am. It came in two gifts, in 1985 and 1987; in 1985 at £30
million and in 1987 at £20 million. Essentially that money
was invested under the oversight of the American Friends of the
National Gallery. It was given not to the National Gallery but
to the American Friends of the National Gallery to administer
it. It is treated as an endowment fund and it has been very shrewdly
and very well managed. The income has been used when and where
it is necessary to support major acquisitions so that in my view
it has, to a very regrettable extent, replaced government funding
for acquisitions. At the time it was given it was expected to
support and enhance the capability of the National Gallery but,
in practice, as funding for acquisitions has been squeezed and
the ring-fenced purchase grant has been abolished and the Heritage
Lottery Fund has moved away from acquisitions, it is now our primary
resource.
Q38 Mr Sanders: What arguments would
you deploy to justify the expenditure of many millions of pounds
on perhaps a single masterpiece?
Dr Smith: I think, unfortunately,
one has to look at the history of the National Gallery since 1824,
that it has always been a collection that has been expected to
grow by acquiring great works of art which are appropriate to
its collection. I think there is a great difference between a
collection which is a static collection—there are examples
in London, both the Wallace Collection and the Sir John Soane's
Museum that do not acquire—and the National Gallery, which
historically has always been able to adapt to changes in taste
and has always been able to acquire great works of art as they
become available, particularly from British private collections.
At the moment my anxiety, which is reflected in the National Gallery's
submission, is exacerbated by the recent Finance Act. Private
owners are taking the view that their primary responsibility is
towards maintaining their estate and maintaining their house and,
therefore, works of art which they have had for many generations,
often made publicly available through open access, sometimes on
loan to national collections, they are now going to sell. We are
getting an increasing number of telephone calls from Sotheby's
and Christie's of major works of art on offer to us but we do
not have the capacity to acquire them. Unfortunately, historically
they have always been very expensive. If you look back at the
history of the National Gallery there have always been parliamentarians
who have felt that there were other priorities, but the reality
is that if the National Gallery is to remain the National Gallery,
an active institution still able to acquire works of art, we have
to pay what they cost.
Q39 Chairman: You flagged up that
it was the select committee report in 1855 which led to the ability
of the National Gallery to expand its collection of Italian art.
I am not sure select committees have quite that power today! Given
that we have heard about the problem that you face in funding
and maintaining the fabric of looking after the collections you
have, and also we heard from the Museums Association about the
enormous importance of Renaissance in the Regions and maintaining
funding for that, is it not arguable at the very least that those
things have to take priority over spending £10 million-plus
on the acquisition of a single new work for the National Gallery?
Dr Smith: I am afraid, again,
I go back to this sense that as a nation I think it is important
for us to be able to acquire not only great works of art but I
think this is a problem which is wider than simply the National
Gallery. Obviously our submission concentrates on our circumstances,
but I know that Sir Nicholas Serota shares my view in terms of
his collection, and I certainly share the view that the Tate Gallery
to remain an active institution needs to be able to acquire works
of art as they are produced. It is an issue which goes deeper
to the measure of regional museums and galleries. Traditionally
Birmingham, Bristol and Newcastle were acquiring institutions,
were acquiring contemporary works as well as historic works, and
that was why they were established, they were established in order
to create collections in the present for the future and, therefore,
I think acquisitions have always been at the heart of the mandate
of museums so that you have to make a judgment as to what the
relative priority is between maintaining our existing priority,
which is quite evidently very important, but also maintaining
a sense of what we exist for to provide a legacy for the future.
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