The entrance to the Burrell Collection in Pollok Country Park.
Sir William Burrell gifted his art collection to the City of Glasgow in 1944, with money to help build a gallery to house it. Burrell stipulated that the new building must be 16 miles from the city centre. This was partly because he believed that a rural setting would show the works to their best advantage, but also to place them far from possible damage by atmospheric pollution caused by Clydeside's fume-belching heavy industries and tenement chimneys. By the time of Burrell's death in 1958, a suitable site had still to be found.
In 1966 Mrs Anne Maxwell Macdonald gave the 360 acre Pollok Estate to the City of Glasgow. Although a mere 4 miles from the city centre, it seemed the perfect location for the vast Burrell collection. The decline in Glasgow's heavy industries and the adoption of clean air legislation helped persuade the trustees of his estate to accept the site and this award-winning, £20 million building opened to the public in 1983.
Reproduced with the permission of Glasgow City Council, Glasgow Museums
Keywords:
art collections, art collectors, art galleries, atmospheric pollution, Burrell Collection, Glasgow City Council, museums, parks, Pollok Estate, Pollok Park
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