More than 180 individuals,families and foundations gifted $100,000 or more to raise $109 million for the new wing of the Art Gallery of NSW,described by the premier as the most transformational cultural project since the opening of the Sydney Opera House.
The portrait of Susan Wakil that hangs in Sydney Modern in tribute to the project’s largest donor.Janie Barrett
And still,private donations have kept coming. Another $25 million has been raised for art commissions,acquisitions and programming,including $3 million for the refurbishment of the existing heritage building. Almost $13.4 million was raised for the art garden alone,the major Indigenous art commission by Jonathon Jones still under construction.
The largest donation was a $24 million gift made by nonagenarian Isaac Wakil and his late wife Susan. The retired businessman had made his fortune in the clothing business and property.
He called David Gonski,the well-connected president of the Art Gallery of NSW Trust,expressing scepticism that the gallery could raise the $100 million it needed to trigger an additional $244 million in NSW government funding to get the project underway.
“What you need is a big impetus,” Wakil told Gonski. “What do you have in mind?” Gonski related at the sod-turning ceremony in 2019.
Private donors contributed $150 million towards the Sydney Modern project including the art installations.Supplied
“How about $20 million?” Wakil offered,and when Gonski was receptive,he added. “Maybe a bit more.”
“It was Isaac Wakil who got this going,” a grateful Gonski said at the time.
Tsering Hannaford’s portrait of Susan Wakil,created shortly after she died in 2018,hangs on an exterior wall of Sydney Modern’s newly named Isaac Wakil Gallery in tribute. The painting is the only hint of sentiment in a building awash with bold artistic statements. At Susan’s elbow is a book with the logo of the building’s architects,SANAA,a reference to the couple’s philanthropic commitment.
The Ainsworth Family,led by poker machine baron Len Ainsworth,developer Aqualand and the Lee family each donated a minimum $10 million,and in return,they received naming rights for their substantial donations:the Aqualand Atrium,the Pearl and Ming Lee Plaza and Art Garden and the Ainsworth Family Gallery.
Billionaire pokies king Len Ainsworth made a substantial donation to Sydney Modern.Dominic Lorrimer
Gretel Packer shares naming rights with former trustee Mark Nelson and his wife Louise for the Tank gallery after each contributed $5 million-plus to turn the decommissioned oil bunker into the subterranean setting for Adrian Villar Rojas’s.
The Lowy Family,the Neilson Foundation,the Oranges&Sardines Foundation,the charity arm of former trustee Geoff Ainsworth and wife Johanna Featherstone,also gifted $5 million and more. The Neilson Foundation has given an additional $3 million-plus towards art acquisitions.
Sir Frank Lowy and Steven Lowy,Gonski’s predecessor on the trust board,are recognised as “lead founders” of the Yiribana gallery dedicated to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art and relocated from the heritage building’s basement to a new prime entry spot.
Nelson,the campaign committee chair,has no doubt that Sydney Modern would not have been built without private money. “It was hard enough getting the government over the line as it was,” he says.
“In effect,the government has put two-thirds of the money in and the privates have put in a third. It’s a great deal for[government],provided they understand the ongoing maintenance of a bigger organisation,which they do.”
Naming rights and the growing reliance on private donations are a direct import of the American model of museum philanthropy,according to Melbourne University’s principal fellow Jo Caust.
“The American mantra is you give,get or get off,” she said. “The dark side comes when you have the situation with the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York where they’ve had to take down the Sackler family name from all their galleries because of their connection with the Oxycontin controversy.”
More particularly,a focus on private philanthropy sidelines the substantial contribution of taxpayers of state and federally funded institutions,while potentially confirming the inherent biases that art museums are for the elites.
“Do you need to have the biggest gallery in the world? I don’t think so.”
Melbourne University’s Jo Caust cautions cities against mega galleries
The names most responsible for realising Sydney Modern are the taxpayers of NSW. The state gave $244 million to the project’s building costs,proceeds from the sale of government assets,and will underwrite its operations by $41.8 million this financial year and similar amounts into the future.
A plaque recognising the government’s contribution will be unveiled on Saturday.
The $109 million given for Sydney Modern set a benchmark for philanthropy across Australia. Trucking magnate Lindsay Fox responded by giving a staggering $100 million to the National Gallery of Victoria’s new contemporary art gallery.
Caust questions the need for constant expansion by all cultural institutions,not just Sydney Modern:“Do you need to have the biggest gallery in the world? I don’t think so.”
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