From 1874 to 1880 the annual amount made available to the Gallery by the Government for the purchase of works of art was £1,500. In 1880 it rose to £5,000. For fifty years after 1896 £2,000 was, on average, all the Gallery received. The grant began to rise steadily after the Second World War. Today acquisitions are acquired mainly through the Foundation, the Art Gallery Society, donations, grants, bequests and gifts. The first Australian oil painting to enter the Art Gallery's collection, William Piguenit's Mount Olympus, Tasmania, was the gift of fifty subscribers. This tradition of patronage has remained crucial to the development of the collections since that time. Important additions to the collections have come through the generosity of James Fairfax, Margaret Olley, Patrick White, Ken and Yasuko Myer, the Mervyn Horton Bequest and the Rudy Komon Fund. Many private endowments take the form of prizes and scholarships for the encouragement of artists, such as the Archibald, Wynne and Sulman Prizes, the Dyason Bequest, the Basil and Muriel Hooper Scholarships, and two art studios in Paris. A newly established programme of Collection Benefactors aims at raising funds for the acquisition, care, study and presentation of works of art for the permanent collection.

(Research by Steven Miller, Archivist)