‘Sad day for Paisley’ as £4m art trove is relocated to Glasgow

Councillor’s dismay as row over display space leads to PAI move

More than £4 million of internationally-renowned art will be relocated to Glasgow after councillors approved the move.

The proposal was made by Paisley Art Institute which owns over 400 pieces of art currently held by OneRen – the culture and leisure arm of Renfrewshire Council.

The institute requested the return of all of its assets after it learned much of it would not be displayed in the new £45m Paisley Museum.

Artists were also furious with the space allocated for its annual exhibitions. The institute had branded the area, situated along a large balcony, as “wholly unacceptable”.

This week, elected representatives unanimously approved the asset hand over, acknowledging the complete breakdown in the relationship between the PAI and OneRen.

Councillor Neil Graham, however, lamented the huge loss to Paisley of both the art institute and its collections.

“It’s a sad day for Paisley,” he said. “The PAI has almost 150 years of bringing art to the people of Paisley and beyond. The museum has been funded and galleries built and maintained by the Coats family and PAI for many years.

“Many of the items owned by PAI were used to showcase Paisley’s culture and traditions as part of the City of Culture bid in 2021. For these items to leave Paisley is very sad as the items should be on display in the newly refurbished museum in 2025.

“The arts institute is the reason Paisley has an art collection and many of the works have not been displayed since the 80s. Art is there to be seen, not to be stored away for decades in cellars and storage rooms.”

He added: “In my view it is a disgrace that OneRen did not do more to secure these works for the people of Paisley and Renfrewshire to learn and enjoy for generations to come.

“OneRen had the responsibility to showcase the fantastic works that the PAI have and they failed to do so. Now, because of that failure, we are losing so much of the town’s history and I only hope that in the future these works will come back to Paisley once the magnitude of this failure has been realised and there is a change in mindset from OneRen.”

The works leaving Paisley include paintings by the Glasgow Boys and prestigious works that have been loaned and displayed all over the world including Yale University in America and the Tate Modern in London. The institute says it is now looking forward to having these works on display in its new home in Glasgow Art Club. It will acknowledge the very rich roots of the PAI which has existed in different forms since 1876.

Anne Hargan of the PAI said: “This is a very sad day for us.

“We love Paisley and have had a presence here since 1876 but we are now pleased to be able to move on from this.

“We are looking forward to having some of our favourite pieces on display at the art club at the same time as our exhibition in April.”

Renfrewshire Council previously stated it had hoped to celebrate the rich history of the PAI in the museum with the use of 43 of its artworks and argued other pieces could have been displayed as exhibitions and stories rotated within the space.

A spokesman said:“We have engaged with Paisley Art Institute (PAI) since 2016 to agree how to integrate their collection artworks into the new museum and formally offered the future use of a large, prominent gallery space for their commercial exhibition. This was declined.

“With the agreement of PAI, OneRen had designed a dedicated, year-round, display of PAI’s collection to celebrate the Institute’s contribution to Paisley’s cultural heritage. An agreement was also in place for their paintings to be part of other planned displays in the new museum. PAI has since withdrawn from these arrangements.

“We attempted to put in place a Collections Agreement with PAI to ensure the storage, insurance and conservation costs of their collection would be covered by them as owners rather than being publicly funded – which they have not agreed to.

“A separate Loan-In Agreement to display 43 artworks from their collection was intended to tell the story of PAI’s important contribution to the town’s cultural legacy. Despite previously agreeing to this in writing, and £53,000 subsequently invested by the Council to conserve these items, the current Trustees have since requested their collection, including the works prepared for display, is returned to them.

“OneRen is working with PAI to enable the safe transfer of their collection items and it is up to them to decide how to give the public access to those artworks in future.

“When Paisley Museum reopens it will be a world-class attraction and will reflect all communities in Renfrewshire – with more than 70 local groups involved in shaping its content. More than 40 per cent of the new displays will include art

objects.”