After 140 years displaying art from around the country, the fate of the New Zealand Academy of Fine Arts now hangs in the balance.
Hopes of saving it rely on the generosity of the charitable trust's members, and an upcoming auction of donated art.
The galleries are based at the heritage Wharf Offices Apartments building in central Wellington.
Wayne Newman recently took over as president of the academy, and tells Lynn Freeman why he's spearheading the last-chance fundraising efforts and why the academy is worth saving.
"It's unique because it was established by artists, I think that's the key thing, and it is a national organisation.
"We have artists in Northland, we have artists in Southland and all the way in between, and when we talk about the members, we are always talking about, for the main part, working artists."
Established in 1882, the New Zealand Academy of Fine Arts is one of the country's longest-serving arts institutions.
The academy opened its first art gallery in Wellington in 1892, a single floor room in Whitmore Street.
It exhibited the work of leading New Zealand artists such as Petrus van der Velden, James Nairn and Frances Hodgkins, purchasing their work for its collection and developing a national collection of New Zealand art that would eventually become the founding collection of Te Papa Tongarewa when it opened in 1999.
"The original intent was to have a gallery and display the art," Newman said.
But after more than a century, it's fallen on tough times.
"In many ways we have not been nimble. Every change in the economic environment, you're not nimble, you face a risk of not surviving."
The group is looking for $90,000 to help get it out of its current fiscal hole of debts.
Newman has only been in the job for a few weeks, and said it's been "crisis management to a certain extent" to deal with the group's troubles.
An appeal to members has helped, with almost $50,000 pledged, Newman said. The news of the academy's difficulty was hard for members.
"It was a little bit of a shock, even for those who have been around for a long time."
The pandemic hasn't helped, but the academy also has to change its ways, he said.
"We needed to change our business model, look much harder at getting sponsorship and things like that, and that really is my task now as president to completely change the business model which has been a little too much focused on being a small society for members."
The current heritage building site on Wellington's waterfront is not cheap to run, he added.
"The reality is these expenses can't be kept flat, you have to accept that they will keep going up.
"But we therefore have to look at how our revenue goes up to match them and that's our failure over the last few years."
The academy prides itself on diversity in its collections.
"It covers everything and it's very hard to say you only see such and such a style. There's so many artists involved.
"We have several hundred artists, and each is pursuing their own vision and style, and when you put that all together on a wall, it's very hard not to see something that you'll fall in love with."
Newman said it's important for the academy to reach out beyond its membership as well with the appeal.
"To the public of Wellington at this point, do you want to support this institution, we've been around for a long time.
"The artists think we're important, and various art societies, but people on the street, do you want to keep us?"
