Joseph Mallord William Turner
The High Street, Oxford
Ashmolean Museum buys Turner’s ‘High Street, Oxford’ The Ashmolean Museum announced that it has raised the money needed to acquire ‘The High Street, Oxford’, a major painting by Joseph Mallord William Turner.]]>
July 8, 2015, source: The Ashmolean Museum
The painting, which has been on loan to the Museum from a private collection since 1997, has beenoffered to the nation in lieu of inheritance tax. The High Street, Oxford would settle £3.5 million ofinheritance tax – which is more than the tax liable on the estate – so the Museum needed to raise thedifference, £860,000, to acquire it. In addition to the £60,000 donated by the public, the Ashmoleanreceived lead support from the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) with a grant of £550,000; a grant of£220,000 from the Art Fund; and a further £30,000 from the Friends and Patrons of the Ashmolean.Now that the funds have been raised, and following the completion of the transfer of the painting tothe nation, it will be permanently allocated to the Ashmolean Museum through the Acceptance in LieuScheme.
Dr Alexander Sturgis, Director of the Ashmolean, says: ‘The Museum has been overwhelmedby public support. With well over 800 people contributing to the appeal, it is clear that the localcommunity, as well as visitors to the Museum from across the world, feel that this picture, the greatestpainting of the city ever made, must remain on show in a public museum in Oxford.
‘We are so grateful to the members of the public who have made donations; to the Heritage LotteryFund and the Art Fund; and to the Friends and Patrons of the Museum. There are big plans for thepainting once we acquire it. It will be lent to regional museums so as many people as possible from thesurrounding area will be able to see it; it will be at the heart of a new series of educational activitiesfor schools and young people; and, not least, it will have pride of place in the Museum’s NineteenthCentury Gallery which will be refurbished and reopened in early 2016.’
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Turner’s ‘Rome, from Mount Aventine’ sells for £30.3 million (news, December 2014)
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