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Camden New Journal -
Published: 24 May 2007

One of the Acts of Mercy paintings

Tate reveals interest in hospital paintings

TATE Gallery chiefs have broken with convention to announce their interest in four historic paintings due to be sold off by University College Hospital trustees.
The Tate, which has two galleries in London and one in Liverpool, could prove to be the saviour of the Acts of Mercy works by British symbolist Frederick Cayley Robinson.
Fears were raised that the paintings would end up in private hands following the hospital’s decision to sell them through Christie’s auctioneers.
The paintings were donated to Middlesex Hospital, in Mortimer Street, Fitzrovia, by collector Sir Edmund Davis nearly a century ago but are now owned by University College London Hospital Trust.
The decision to sell them, made in February, has triggered outrage among conservationists and former staff of Middlesex Hospital, which is now closed.
A Tate spokeswoman said last week: “When we’ve acquired works we always announce it. It goes on our website and our annual report but up to that point we can’t talk about anything we’re doing.
“We don’t talk about works that are not part of the collection. We’ve got no comment to make.”
But two days later the Tate revealed it was having talks with the trust “to find ways these important works might be retained for public benefit, as Sir Edmund Davis intended”.
The statement came the day after UCLH announced it would defer the sale for six months to give “suitable institutions” time to raise funds.
UCLH has been criticised for ignoring the hospital’s history and for “selling off the birthright of London”.
Artist Chris Price, of St John’s Wood, questioned the legality of the hospital’s decision to sell, while writer Jack Budden, of Fitzroy Square said: “My fear is the trustees are not honouring past benefactors and seem to be insensible to a wide range of artefacts of much cultural value.”
A UCLH spokesman said that, following the sale of Middlesex Hospital in 2006, there was nowhere suitable within the trust for the paintings – of considerable size – to be re-located.
He added that the cost of re-framing the paintings alone would have run into tens of thousands of pounds.

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