Dave Cull’s wife was stopped in the street because his was such a poor likeness.
Now, Aaron Hawkins might not even get one.
A Dunedin City Council tradition with a haphazard recent history will be up for debate at the council’s civic affairs committee meeting on Monday.
A staff report, to be presented at next week’s meeting, said the formal recognition of former mayors traditionally included recognition on the council honours board, the addition of a gold link to the 1909 mayoral chain, and the commissioning of a mayoral portrait.
Yet, the practice of the mayoral portrait and mayoral chain had never been reviewed, it said.
There was a 2008 instruction that mayoral portraits should be similar to paintings in the council chamber, some of which date back to the 19th century.
There also had been some recent notable exceptions.
"All of the current mayoral portraits are oil paintings with the exception of the photographic portrait of Mayor Turner," the report said.
It went on to say the committee could request a report on options for recognising the service of former mayors.
"There are a number of factors including escalating costs of both a painted portrait and a photographic portrait, where the burden of costs for this might fall, the challenge of engaging portrait artists, the size and weight of the mayoral chains, and how the chains might best be preserved for future generations."
Traditionally, the outgoing mayor personally funded the link to the mayoral chain, "which in the past has cost around $2400".
Of present concern, the service of the most recent former mayor, Mr Hawkins, had yet to be formally recognised, it said.
Council staff spoke to Mr Hawkins, seeking his views.
"He advised that he believed that any decision to discontinue such traditions is one better made in principle and on that basis offered no preference," the report said.
Mr Hawkins could not be reached for comment yesterday by the Otago Daily Times.
His successor, Dunedin Mayor Jules Radich, said he believed it was "very unfair" for the ODT to ask him his views ahead of the committee discussion "when it’s a discussion that I’d have to sit back from".
"I have raised my personal opinion about it to the chief executive, and I am not going to discuss what my opinion was."
Mayor Jules Radich said he was an "art collector" and had oil paintings on the walls of his home.
However, he was "someone who is driven by practicality and pragmatism", he said.
Dame Sukhi yesterday recalled when she asked Sir Grahame Sydney if he would paint hers and he said, "I don’t think the council could afford it."
In the end, she found another artist, who was paid $6000.
However, Dame Sukhi said the painting had "sort of like, a split personality".
"It captured my likeness in half of it.
"There was one brown ... Indian ... on one side and the other one was a woman of white colour."
She paid for the painting herself and now only family and close friends ever saw it.
"It was so damn awful, I didn’t let it breathe the air."
She insisted on a photographic portrait, instead.
"There was a big kerfuffle about it of course, and being a woman mayor too, the misogyny was interesting.
"We live in an era where we have to count every penny given the natural disasters that are occurring and I would have thought a portrait of a mayor would be sort of inconsequential.
"A photograph does the trick."
Joan Wilson, wife of the late former mayor Mr Cull, said her husband wanted a photograph instead of a painting and thought the money would be better spent elsewhere.
But he was voted down.
"Dave saw a photo of it, he didn’t see the actual portrait, but he said, ‘Oh, he’s probably just captured me when I was sick.’
"But I just didn’t think it was him at all," she said.
She was not a fan of the painting, "and a lot of people didn’t like it".
"In fact, people, after the unveiling, stopped me in the street and they said they thought it was an awful likeness of him."
A photograph would have done the trick, she said.
The staff report said council staff would liaise with other councils to see what mechanisms they used to recognise the service of former mayors.
If agreed, a report would be prepared for a future civic affairs committee meeting, it said.
