Ashburton Art Gallery and Heritage Centre

About

Ashburton Art Gallery and Heritage Centre is an art gallery and museum complex located in the town of Ashburton, New Zealand, owned and operated by the Ashburton District Council. The Ashburton Museum opened in 1972 and moved along with the Ashburton Art Gallery into former County Council buildings in 1995. The museum moved into a new purpose-built facility in 2014, the art gallery following it in 2015. Both institutions merged into a single organisation under the Ashburton District Council in 2021.

In 1983 Ashburton Society of Arts president Alison Ryde proposed an arts centre with public exhibition space for local artists and craftspeople. In 1985 the Ashburton Arts Centre Association was set up with the aim of creating an art gallery in Ashburton. It initially focussed on securing Ashburton Borough Council land on West Street, but permission was not forthcoming so their efforts were devoted to fundraising instead. Four years later the group partnered with the Ashburton Historical Society to petition the District Council for a space in the former County Council building.

Curator/Manager Kathryn Mitchell was appointed in 2005 and left in 2011 to take up a tutoring role at Southern Institute of Technology. She was replaced as curator by Shirin Khosraviani. The Art Gallery was managed by Ashburton Art Gallery Incorporated until 2021, when it was merged with the Museum and came under the management of Ashburton District Council.

The gallery has a permanent collection of over 700 works, with over 2000 more on long-term loan. A significant part of its collection is works by Ashburton-born children's book author and illustrator David Elliot, including drawings from books such as The Making of the Word Witch (a collaboration with Margaret Mahy ), The Moon and Farmer McPhee and Lewis Carroll's The Hunting of the Snark. Other artists represented in its permanent collection are Rudolf Gopas, Nigel Brown, Philip Clairmont, and Philip Trusttum.

The gallery partners with the Zonta International Club of Ashburton to offer an annual Zonta Ashburton Female Art Award. Along with a cash prize, the winner wins the opportunity to hold a solo exhibition in the gallery.

Curator/Manager Kathryn Mitchell was appointed in 2005 and left in 2011 to take up a tutoring role at Southern Institute of Technology. She was replaced as curator by Shirin Khosraviani. The Art Gallery was managed by Ashburton Art Gallery Incorporated until 2021, when it was merged with the Museum and came under the management of Ashburton District Council.

The gallery has a permanent collection of over 700 works, with over 2000 more on long-term loan. A significant part of its collection is works by Ashburton-born children's book author and illustrator David Elliot, including drawings from books such as The Making of the Word Witch (a collaboration with Margaret Mahy ), The Moon and Farmer McPhee and Lewis Carroll's The Hunting of the Snark. Other artists represented in its permanent collection are Rudolf Gopas, Nigel Brown, Philip Clairmont, and Philip Trusttum.

The gallery partners with the Zonta International Club of Ashburton to offer an annual Zonta Ashburton Female Art Award. Along with a cash prize, the winner wins the opportunity to hold a solo exhibition in the gallery.

The Ashburton Historical Society, led by Harry Scotter, Ethel McQuilkin, and Ellis Woods, first met on 30 October 1958. Their aim was to establish a museum in Ashburton, and the collection was first housed in a building on the corner of Cass and Tancred streets. In 1960 librarian Thelma McArtney joined the Historical Society committee and stressed the importance of collecting photographs, and photographing buildings in danger of demolition. Six years later the Society arranged a display of local history in Balmoral Hall, previously the Assembly Hall of Ashburton Technical College. The society hoped in the late 1960s to move into the former Ashburton Library building, vacated in 1967 when the new library was built, but was unsuccessful.

The Ashburton Borough Council offered the Society a small building on Tancred Street that was originally the Hospital Board Office, later the County Engineer's office, and eventually a women's rest room. Dubbed Pioneer Hall, it was Ashburton's first museum building, and opened in March 1972. It was staffed by volunteers and opened every afternoon except Saturdays and every Friday evening, and was run by the Ashburton Historical Society which became an incorporated society in 1973.

In 1974 one of the former Ashburton Technical School buildings space became available in Cameron Street, and museum began moving into the more spacious rooms in 1976. The new building was formally opened by Canterbury Museum's Roger Duff in October 1978. The Cameron Street building eventually proved to be too small, cold, and damp, with no fire alarm or extinguishers, so in 1989, together with the Arts Centre Association, the Historical Society approached the District Council to share building space in the former County Council offices on Baring Square.

By 1978 the museum had a paid staff member, Mrs M. E. Kenny, who worked four hours a week, increasing to six hours a week by 1987. She was replaced that year by Rita Wright who with the assistance of the Historical Society committee catalogued the collection, initially on a cross-referenced card system and eventually databasing it in PastPerfect. Ashburton Museum heavily depended on Lynda Wallace of the museum liaison service which operated through the 1980s and early 1990s. Wright continued as curator for almost 20 years, and was succeeded by Michael Hanrahan in December 2006. Ashburton DIstrict Council took over management of the museum in 2014 with the opening of the Heritage Centre.

The museum has both cultural history and natural history collections, as well as approximately 250,000 photographs; significant items include

- A 90 million year old petrified woord found on an Alford Forest farm in the 1990s

- A doll named Sarah Jane brought to New Zealand on one of the first settler ships in the 1850s

- a large collection of negatives from Ashburton commercial photographer Charles Tindall, mostly taken during the 1960s and 1970s

- A similarly large photographic collection from Gordon Binsted

By 1978 the museum had a paid staff member, Mrs M. E. Kenny, who worked four hours a week, increasing to six hours a week by 1987. She was replaced that year by Rita Wright who with the assistance of the Historical Society committee catalogued the collection, initially on a cross-referenced card system and eventually databasing it in PastPerfect. Ashburton Museum heavily depended on Lynda Wallace of the museum liaison service which operated through the 1980s and early 1990s. Wright continued as curator for almost 20 years, and was succeeded by Michael Hanrahan in December 2006. Ashburton DIstrict Council took over management of the museum in 2014 with the opening of the Heritage Centre.

The museum has both cultural history and natural history collections, as well as approximately 250,000 photographs; significant items include

- A 90 million year old petrified woord found on an Alford Forest farm in the 1990s