Titian - the ingrates have a field day
March 1 2012
Picture: NG & NGS
The comments section of the Guardian is always a good place to go for sound thinking on the arts. Here's a few snippets in reaction to the Titian purchase:
It's a crap painting, idiotic titillation as artful as page 3, and the money spent on this rubbish is disgraceful while real artists scrape a living.
I love the idea of Titian not being 'a real artist'.
It's a terrible waste of funds spent on a novelty which only 12 people will ever see.
I would love to have seen the Duke of Sutherland donate these for free. Given that this was never going to happen (which is a damning indictment of the man), this is definitely the second best course of action.
More public money to money-grubbing aristocrats. Time for change.
The wealth of his family was made from the robbery of many. And the descendents of thieves and gangsters that are today's royals and old aristocratic families have the nerve to look down on 'new money'.
This presumably refers to the Highland Clearances, carried out by the Sutherlands. But for what it's worth the present Duke of Sutherland's picture collection comes from Bridgewater money (digging canals), not Sutherland money.
Finally, the 'schools 'n hospitals' brigade:
If you spent 50,000 on educating 900 people, that is £45m.
And so it goes on.
