Gifts with strings attached

A row erupted yesterday over the Mond Bequest, a group of 43 Renaissance pictures which were left to the National Gallery in 1924. The story highlights the dilemmas involved in dealing with donors and their descendants. Dr Ludwig Mond, a wealthy chemical manufacturer, had bequeathed the paintings in the belief that they would be displayed in a room bearing his name. Thanks to the bequest, his name would live on for ever. But instead, the National Gallery later integrated his paintings into its chronological display, so few visitors today are aware of his generosity.

The Mond descendants are furious, and one of Ludwig's great-great-grandsons is threatening legal action. Richard Hornsby, who is now demanding the return of the pictures, points out that his family paid half the costs of the special room to house the Mond paintings - and he accuses the National Gallery of breaking the terms of the bequest when it dispersed them.

For separate reasons, he argues that Mond's widow later wanted 12 works in the original bequest to go to her children, although the gallery argues this issue was resolved in the 1920s.

With the opening of the Sainsbury Wing in 1991, director Neil MacGregor altered the traditional hang, by national "schools", and then opted for a much simpler and clearer chronological display. This completed the dispersal of the Mond Bequest throughout the Gallery, leaving the Mond room to be used for other works. The splitting up of the collection had begun earlier, in 1945, when the pictures were returned from safekeeping after the war.

Eleven of the finest Mond paintings are now in the main displays in several rooms, including Raphael's magnificent Crucified Christ with the Virgin Mary, known as the Mond Crucifixion. Painted in 1503 for an Umbrian church, it was bought by Dr Mond in 1892.

Other major Mond pictures on the Gallery's upper floor include works by Bellini, Botticelli, Cranach, Ghirlandaio, Mantegna and Titian. A further 18 Mond paintings are in the reserve collection downstairs.

Until recently, the lower-floor reserve rooms were normally open to the public, although they are densely and unsympathetically displayed. But with the recent financial squeeze, warding costs had to be saved, and since September they have been open only on Wednesday afternoons.

Twelve pictures from the bequest are off show all together. These include two works by Correggio, which are damaged fragments of fresco, as well as an altarpiece of the Virgin and Child with St Paul by Francesco Bissolo and two paintings by Gaudenzio Ferrari: Christ rising from the Tomb and St Andrew.

It's quite a surprise that so many works should have been taken out of public view, since the National Gallery prides itself on displaying its full collection (except for works in conservation or on loan). Indeed, until recently, the gallery printed the slogan "the nation's pictures on permanent display" on its note- paper.

Two further Mond works, ancient Fayum mummy portraits, are on long-term loan to the British Museum, which is at least an appropriate setting for them.