An early morning anecdote which caught my attention.
It seems that back in the twenties or thirties a then well known sculptor made a portrait head of Osbert Sitwell, a head which at some point was given to the Tate Gallery in Millbank. Somewhat later still, Sitwell was rather surprised when visiting the place to be smartly & ostentatiously saluted by one of the gallery guards.
The guard explained that he knew him well as he had the dusting of him every morning.
Apart from anything else, the idea of someone who gives things to museums actually visiting them seems rather odd now. People who leave things to museums don't visit and I can't imagine that the tycoons and moguls whom I assume to be the usual sort of live donor actually visiting the places: the anecdote suggests a quite different sort of relationship between donor, management and place.
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