Dunedin Public Art Gallery - History

History

The gallery was founded by W.M. Hodgkins in 1884 and was the first public art gallery in New Zealand. It originally occupied what is now the maritime gallery in the Otago Museum, was re-located to the Municipal Chambers in the Octagon from 1888–1890, and then to an annexe to the Otago Museum. It moved to a new purpose-designed building in Queen's Gardens in 1907, to which a structure housing the Otago Settlers Museum was added the following year. In 1927 it was moved to a building constructed for the 1925-6 New Zealand and South Seas International Exhibition in Logan Park, Dunedin North designed by Edmund Anscombe. The building was bought and donated to the city by Sir Percy and Lady Sargood, as a memorial to their son who was killed at Gallipoli. The gallery was relocated to its present site, the refitted D.I.C. building, in 1996.

In its long existence the gallery has played host to numerous overseas exhibitions, including Masterpieces of the Guggenheim a 1990s modern art show, and the touring Tate Gallery exhibition The Pre-Raphaelite Dream, more recently.

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