IAN Murray is unusually error prone in his piece “Cultural Quarter scheme could be picture perfect”, even by his standards.

He confidently states that the Chipperfield Bequest “stated that the art should be used to fund an art gallery but also (sic) an art school, something that was never done”.

The bequest itself was in part to be used to fund the art gallery, which came to fruition when the fourth block of the Civic Centre, the art block, was completed in early 1939.

Furthermore, an art school was indeed incorporated, as detailed in the Echo on April 25 1939: “The School of Art occupies the whole of the ground floor and lower ground floor under the Art Gallery, and the same two floors in the west wing. This forms the largest part of the new building, and comprises 69 rooms.”

I can only hope that those people charged with making the important decisions about the future of Southampton’s art collection engage in considerably more research than Mr Murray does.

PETER NEAL, Eastleigh

EDITOR’S NOTE: I stand corrected.

However, and this is surely the point here, the art school demanded by the Chipperfield Bequest no longer exists. Using a fraction of the city’s enormous art collection to pay for the new Cultural Quarter with its education facilities puts right that wrong.