Unhappiness at The Wallace Collection

The Daily Telegraph had a report the other day about managerial issues at The Wallace Collection, with curatorial departures, cutbacks in opportunities for research, and tensions over how the collection is presented. The article can be read at Prestigious Wallace Collection is ‘haemorrhaging curatorial expertise’

The Wallace Collection is one of the lesser known parts of the national museums and galleries in London, a fact which to my mind makes it all the more appealing. Held in an aristocratic town house within its own gardens, yet still so very close to the West End, it has retained the feel of a very personal and very select collection, idiosyncratic at times, but rich in quality and full of familiar faces - not least the portrait of Robert Dudley Earl of Leicester as a young and dashing courtier, Franz Hal’s ‘The Laughing Cavalier’ and Fragonard’s ‘The Swing’. The visitor can get close to such works - indeed it is difficult not to in so crowded a display space - and to the spectacular pieces of late medieval armour. This is a collection to go to and set out on a journey of intellectual discovery. It always seemed to me a very civilised place.

If the article is to be believed ( and I fear I suspect there is no reason not to ) my attitude would be condemned by the current state powers-that-be at the Wallace as wickedly old fashioned and elitist. By its very nature the Collection is elitist, and it should be properly proud of that fact. To lose curatorial excellence and expertise over the vain pursuit of some modish modern mode of appealing to the masses is very regrettable indeed. Dumbing down will not raise awareness of the Wallace Collection, but celebrating its richness and insight into the world of past elites will.