GAZING with pride at the new glass lift which will grace the refurbished wing of the National Gallery, Carmel Naughton reflects on her recent appointment as chairman of the Board of Governors and Guardians of the Gallery. "It's an, awesome responsibility," she says, referring respectfully to the calibre of her predecessor, Bill Finlay "but I think I'm up to it."
As we walk through the newly painted rooms, where paintings are being re hung and the finishing touches put in place in preparation for their reopening to the public on May 18th, this non specialist art lover talks about her enormous sense of excitement at the next phase of the gallery's development.
Having served as a member of the board since 1991, and as vice chairman since 1993, she has had plenty of time to learn what her anew role entails. Unusually for a national institution, the chairman of the National Gallery's board is elected by the other board members, so Carmel Naughton has had the added boost of the endorsement of her colleagues, as she chairs their meetings on policy decisions. When the gallery's press officer points out that she is the first woman chairman, she responds quickly I like to say that I'm the best man for the job."
Her chief concern is that the National Gallery should be as accessible as possible. "The gallery belongs to the Irish people. I would like it to be a welcoming place," she says, which even children can enjoy. I want to see more people coming in, who can appreciate the paintings, though not necessarily in an academic way.
It's hardly surprising that Carmel Naughton's emphasis is on the broad educational activities of the gallery the round of lectures, tours and publications that aim to stimulate public interest in art. As a schoolgirl in Monaghan in the 1950s, her own appreciation of art was awakened by a committed teacher, Sister David, who organised an art club for the filth year students, with Carmel as president, and encouraged them to find out for themselves about the great painters and sculptors of the past. She opened up a whole world to me, Carmel says and gave me a life long interest.
Before that hers had been a childhood bereft of paintings", although she and her five sisters and three brothers had been encouraged by their parents to become voracious readers. She speaks fondly of her father, a garda, and her mother, "a Bible thumping teetotaller" who discovered the mellowing effects of brandy during the couple's brief stint in Zambia. On family visits to Dublin, the National Gallery was "just one attraction among many", competing with department stores and cinemas, and to Carmel it was a rather forbidding, "elitist" place, which required specialist knowledge.
Primary school teacher training in Limerick followed which, in the early 1960s, "did nothing to encourage an interest in art", she remembers. As a young married woman she taught in Monaghan for six years until her first baby was born, returning to work when her husband, Martin Naughton, "had the brilliant idea" of starting his own business a business, Glen Dimplex, which now employs 6,000 people worldwide and has become the sponsor, in conjunction with the IMMA, of a major annual prize for contemporary visual art.
Carmel relished the freedom she had as a primary teacher. "I know they talk about teachers' stress now, but once the classroom doors are closed, you are your own boss. I particularly loved teaching the fifth class. At that stage, children are just learning to reason for themselves. It was very difficult to give up work," she says, but she did, to become a full time parent of her three children, now in their twenties.
A diploma in European painting from TCD helped formalise her knowledge of art, which was already developing as she and her husband began to build up the collection of late 19th and early 20th century Irish paintings that now adorns their Co Meath home, Staekallen House. "We are obviously very fortunate to be able to collect these paintings," she says, carefully. "We are only the guardians of them for our lifetime. We are curating them and then they will be handed on, either to our children, or they will be bought back by the State."
She was invited to join the board by the former Taoiseach, Charles Haughey, who now chairs a newly established fund raising group, the National Gallery of Ireland Foundation, of which Carmel's husband Martin is also a member. The foundation will "identify Irish people, individuals and corporations", who will help to fund the construction of the planned major extension to the gallery, to be completed by 1999 with a new entrance on Clare Street.
The new extension, which is estimated to cost £13.5 million with £6 million to be raised by the foundation, will include galleries of sufficient standard to show international travelling exhibitions a Yeats museum to house a national collection of work by the Yeats family a multi media room for the accessing of works of art by CD Rom and on the Internet fully equipped conservation studios for the maintenance and repair of paintings an upgraded library and resource centre for art historians and students, and additional restaurant and enlarged book shop.
We have an important collection here our paintings are always being requested abroad Carmel Naughton says. We are, trying to put the National Gallery up there with the best international galleries. We want to walk tall.
ALTHOUGH obviously preferring to emphasise positive developments she acknowledges the gallery's difficulties, especially that of under staffing, despite an annual grant of £1.8 million from the State. "Yes, that is a major problem. While we will be fully open for May 17th, we are very concerned that having spent so much tax payers money on this refurbishment programme we will be faced with no choice but to leave important rooms', closed unless we can get additional staff. We have 36 rooms' with only 26 security attendants. We are not asking for something impossible here."
Another cause of concern to art historians, students and visitors is the gallery's library which has not adequately served the needs of, either the staff or the public for many years and is effectively closed. It is currently being computerised, Carmel says, but has also been badly affected by the staffing embargo. The assistant librarian, who left recently, has not been replaced. In its new home in the planned Clare Street wing, Carmel hopes that the library "will be a great resource", along with an expanded bookshop.
Visitor numbers continue to rise, now reaching 1.2 million a year, and Carmel emphasises the importance of the gallery as a centre for tourists. Isn't there a danger with increased emphasis on shopping opportunities, the restaurants and the trimmings, that the art will become marginalised?
"Well, modern consumers are very demanding. The more facilities you can put before them, the more entertained they are," she says, with the voice of someone used to keeping children amused.
"But, of course, while the shop and the restaurant are important for revenue, they are really a side issue. The most important thing is to have as many fine paintings on show as possible."
