Arts champion Sir James Wallace may be 79 this year but he’s as busy as ever chairing his companies, his arts trust, visiting art galleries and artists, ballets and theatre and funding the arts from his four-storey arts and crafts mansion Rannoch in Epsom, Auckland.
Sir James, who was knighted for his contribution to the arts is probably best known for his investments in film and art. He began collecting artworks by young artists in the 1960s and has built it to an astounding 9000-collection.
In 1992 he transferred his collection to the newly established James Wallace Arts Trust, which since 2010 has been based in the historic Pah Homestead in Auckland's Monte Cecilia Park and also in a Morrinsville art gallery. The trust continues to add about 500 news works each year.
Twenty years ago he also established the annual Wallace Art Awards, which are now the longest surviving and richest annual art awards of their kind in Australasia.
Sir James is the founding trustee of various charitable trusts. He is the founding underwriter of the Auckland Chamber Orchestra and founding patron of the Auckland Theatre Company, NZ Opera, NZ Ballet, and a member of the board of the Auckland Philharmonia. In 2001 he was appointed to a three-year term on the NZ Film Commission.
Sir James has funded or help fund a succession of short films and features, from pioneering gay dramas (Squeeze, A Death in the Family) to box office champion Hunt for the Wilderpeople and the offbeat Love Story. He has provided funding to a long series of films through the Wallace Arts Trust, and Wallace Productions.
Desperate Remedies remains the most ambitious film Sir James has produced. Made entirely inside a studio – a converted warehouse – the period melodrama was directed by Main and Peter Wells. Desperate Remedies was invited to screen at the 1993 Cannes Film Festival, where it won acclaim.
Sir James established Wallace Corporation in 1996, consolidating a number of family companies and his own businesses, which included the Wallford Meats processing plant at Waitoa. His early career was as a solicitor and company secretary working. Two years ago he merged Wallace Corporation with the Spence family’s Farm Brands Ltd to create Wallace Group Ltd Partnership.
Wallace Corporation’s farms, along with its investments in technology companies Aduro Bioploymers and Ligar Polymers and Chilean dairy farming business Manuka, were also excluded from the merger and remain with Wallace Corporation.
Wallace Group has gone on this year to add Nichols (NZ) Limited to its operation. Nichols is a specialist tannery and has a significant casualty stock collector network across the South Island.