New Beginnings: Classic Paintings from the Corrigan Collection of 21st Century Aboriginal Art, Emily McCulloch Childs and Ross Gibson with a preface by Margo Neale, McCulloch & McCulloch, 156pp, $79.95.
From the Australian:
When Therese Rein recently launched the book New Beginnings: Classic Paintings from the Corrigan Collection of 21st Century Aboriginal Art, she spoke about the passion and dedication of the collector, how such people “loved the thrill of the hunt”.
When Patrick Corrigan came forward to speak to the twilight gathering at Brisbane’s Gallery of Modern Art, he too spoke about that thrill. “People say I should be thanked,” he said, referring to the response from galleries that have received donations from him during the past decades. “But really, I don’t deserve that. I do it because it’s fun.”
It’s also a kind of good business, as Corrigan well knows. The collector and benefactor, who has worked all his life in the freight business, sits on the Government’s Committee on Taxation Incentives for the Arts, the group that advises the Department of the Environment, Water, Heritage and the Arts about the administration of the Cultural Gifts Program, established in 1978.
The committee, chaired by Anna Malgorzewicz, director of the Museum and Art Gallery of the Northern Territory, has the task of assessing whether the valuations required as part of the gift documentation “reflect current market value”.
