ON FEBRUARY 14th, the Taoiseach will formally open the Hunt Museum in Limerick and at last the celebrated Hunt Collection will have its own, permanent building and adequate exhibition space. At the time of writing the converted Custom House, an 18th century stone building on the quays, is still as busy as an anthill. The conversion work is essentially complete but several more anxious, hectically busy days loom ahead before the collections is finally placed for public display.
John Hunt, who is acting director of the museum, as well as being the son of the late John Hunt and his wife Gertrude ("Putzel"), is both satisfied and anxious. The builders, working under the guidance of the Office of Public Works, have done their work well - and there was a great ideal to do, since even the stairs are brand new. The building, vacated some years ago by civil servants, was sound in structure but run down inside. The next step after that was the actual display work, as glass fronted cases were installed and the precious objects began to be placed in them in many cases, tentatively or provisionally.
Experts had been recruited for the work, including Robin Wade from London, a respected figure in the museum world who has designed the showcases and general, display. Meanwhile, the restorer Mary McGrath, came up to consult Hunt hurriedly about the work she had just completed on a late Gothic panel of the Magdalen - probably German and probably from a long vanished or dismembered altarpiece. The so called Beaufort Tapestry is in the hands of another restorer, Cliona Devitt. Other experienced helpers on hand include Ruairi O Cuiv, formerly of Temple Bar Gallery and the Douglas Hyde Gallery. Coincidentally, John Hunt himself had been a director of the Temple Bar Gallery but resigned in 1990 to devote himself to being virtual custodian of his parents' life work.
He admits, a little ruefully, that these displays cannot go by the book or the ground plan. What seems impeccable on paper, so he has found, often simply does not work in practice, does not "look right". And he does not want a historicist, step by step approach but wants to create an informal, almost domestic "feel"; the first room you enter is called the Prologue Room, which he says is "about surprise. We wanted just to bounce off different things together." Stands and drawers hold a range of art objects ranging from a small Picasso drawing to a 14th century alabaster vessel.
In an adjacent room stands a 16th century carved figure from Augsburg, superb examples of Limoges enamelwork (the late John Hunt, though a wide ranging connoisseur, was essentially a medievalist) are already on view and the so called Archer Butler Luck Stone, actually of glass or crystal, which was used chiefly as an amulet for animals. Hung around the necks of cattle, it was supposed to cure them of the murrain and other diseases.
In another room pottery and china are arranged, but in a deliberately domestic way, not impersonally. Nearby are pieces of silver, mostly 18th century, including the Midleton Mace from Co Cork. Jewellery - brooches, rings, necklets etc. - is everywhere, and majolica ware is prominent, but a special place of honour, in the middle of a small room or cabinet, is reserved for one of the collection's centrepieces - the small bronze of a rearing horse, which scholars suppose to have been cast after a lost clay model by Leonardo da Vinci. This, presumably, was the maquette for the great bronze horse which was to stand in a square in Milan but which for a number of reasons was never cast. According to legend, invading French crossbowmen engaged in a drunken archery contest shot the big clay model to pieces.
Yet another ground floor room holds "anything not in the primary galleries," says the director,"stuff we can just pull out and show". One drawer contains a piece of tapestry, while laid out on display are a rusty helmet, a medieval chest with the initials EAI on the lid and a clutter of other objects big and small. In a corner, not yet in place, is a Giacometti drawing of a woman, while a Picasso pencil sketch of a woman (an early work, I estimate) bears on the reverse side a donkey and a human head.
THE more antiquarian works are mostly upstairs (from which you have fine views through the large, 18th century windows across the grey waters of the Shannon), including an early Greek wooden figure (a rarity) of a man, with the face missing which allows the joinery work to be seen. There are magnificent small Cycladic carvings, notable Egyptian pieces, Roman and Etruscan works, including a marble head of an unknown woman showing her carefully arranged coiffure. Bronze Age artefacts, both from Ireland and continental Europe, crowd together: swords, shields, daggers, cauldrons. Then come Viking axe heads and monastic bells from early Christian Ireland, ranged in order of size - the biggest is incised with a cross. Another of the collection's highlights, the Antrim Cross, is prized particularly as an early example of enamelwork.
There will be a section entirely given over to religious art, ranging from medieval pieces down to the so called Penal Crosses which, in fact, were probably pilgrimage souvenirs. (A fine Sheela na Gig in another room scarcely qualifies under this heading). Decorative art will also have a space of its own. John Hunt has created hanging banners of reinforced paper as signage for the various areas and most of these use as motifs some detail or piece from the collection but greatly enlarged. And, he added, by the evening of the following day, 1,500 labels were to be made, and ready for installation.
A room has been specially set aside for seminars, lectures and scholarly get togethers, since the museum is designed to have an educational role and to be stimulating visually for young people in particular. There will even be a small "touch it room" for children which, as Hunt says, will "give them that tactile experience." In The Epilogue Room, where the viewer or visitor theoretically should finish up, there are deliberate, pictorial reminders of the collection's original provenance in John Hunt's words, "that it came from a home rather than from an institution".
Finally, in a large, workshop like space below, lay rows of artefacts which had just been unpacked from crates (some of the collection had been on display for a period in the University of Limerick, in a kind of mini museum of its own: certain other items had been on loan and others stored in bank vaults). Ranged along trestle tables were medieval woodcarvings, mostly polychrome; a very rare panel painting by the pre Renaissance Italian artist Bernardo Daddi; crucifixes, an intricate piece of Chinese pottery or porcelain with miniature houses which, apparently, was meant to grow tiny flowers or plants; a fascinating medley of items culled from many periods and places. After all these have been duly installed, the room will be put to the service of Paul O'Reilly of the City Art Gallery, whose premises are being completely renovated and reshaped. Probably he will hang his painting collection there, or at least the cream of it - which includes works by Jack Yeats.
THE Hunt Collection is virtually unique of its kind, and one of the few large private collections which was not dispersed after the death of its creators or sold wholesale either to dealers or some high powered American institution. Recent estimates of its value have gone as high as £35 million, though the general feeling is that such a figure is too low.
Yet neither John Hunt the Elder (who died in 1976) nor his wife, who died only a few years ago, were wealthy people in the accepted sense. Neither of them inherited money and though in the 1930s they ran a respected antique business in London, temperamentally they were always driven more by buying than to selling. In those days, with knowledge and flair, dedicated people such as they were, could amass fine collections without expending much capital - which they did not have anyway. Where they were almost unique was in keeping what they bought. As their reputations grew, they earned money on commission by advising other, monied collectors, and they were also sought after as evaluators and cataloguers. Yet to the end, they lived relatively simply.
The elder Hunt was at various times a member of the Arts Council of Ireland, a member of the National Monuments Advisory Council and a committee member of the Friends of the National Collections. Though his training in art and antiques was pragmatic rather than academic, he was also a respected archaeologist and he was a good enough art historian in his own area to write a valuable book on medieval Irish sculpture. Towards the end of his life, his reputation as an expert was international and Sothebys, in particular often called on his knowledge.
The museum that bears' his name will have its own staff and director (his son merely acts in that capacity) and, for the initial period, fairly generous funding. But after that it is on its own, apart, from a yearly grant of £25,000 from Limerick Corporation for running costs, so it must in effect generate its own revenue. To do that, it must charge an admission fee of £3 a head and John Hunt admits that he has his fingers crossed after the official opening, to see if and how the public will turn up in sufficient numbers.
He will start to find out on the morning of Saturday, February 15th, when the museum will officially be open to the public for the first time. Opening hours will be 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., Tuesdays to Saturdays (with the usual Monday closure) and on Sundays from 2 to 5 p.m.
