The walls of most art galleries are made of bricks and mortar but it could be said that the Masterworks Foundation Gallery at the Botanical Gardens in Paget was built on fibreglass onions, Bermuda hogs and bicycle tires.Well, maybe not literally.The latest art exhibit at the Masterworks ‘A Rock and an Ocean’ celebrates Masterworks’ 25th anniversary, it is open now and runs until September.“There have been a lot of highlights mixed in with a lot of lowlights,” said founder Tom Butterfield, of the 25 years. “The highlights would clearly be getting people engaged in the process of believing that something like this could work. Twenty-five years ago I would never have believed that we would one day have a museum and a collection that looks like this.”Masterworks had its humble beginnings in a tiny shop in Front Street. Mr Butterfield dreamed of one day opening a gallery that promoted local art, and also repatriated works done by famous artists such as American painter Winslow Homer.Over the years, Masterworks’ fundraising efforts have been almost as creative as Homer’s artwork: They have auctioned off fibreglass hogs and onions made by the community. Mr Butterfield has cycled thousands of miles across Britain to raise money, sacrificing his knees along the way. They shook hands endlessly and held a telethon that raised $50,000. Finally, the Masterworks Foundation opened the doors of Bermuda’s first purpose-built gallery in March 2008.Mr Butterfield said one of the greatest days for Masterworks Foundation was receiving Homer’s ‘Inland Waters’ as a gift from a very generous local family. They also purchased, with the assistance of the community and foundations such as the Christian Humann Foundation, Homer’s ‘SS Trinidad’ and ‘Opposite Ireland Island’.“They didn’t give ‘Inland Waters’ to us outright until we became a museum and we had the right environment to house it,” he said. “‘Inland Waters’ was a gift to the United States State Department, but in the mid-1980s they passed an edict that any work on its walls had to be American in content,” said Mr Butterfield. “That was how it got into the public domain.“The third Homer came up when we were building the museum. This is where Homer made a bit of a liar out of me. I had promised the board that no acquisitions of paintings while we are trying to campaign for the building, but I realised early on that there are people who do bricks and mortar and people who do paintings. So we were able to raise money for both things.”He said it was unlikely that any more of Homer’s Bermuda works would come up for sale again, and Masterworks currently holds about 15 percent of them.“When the Homers are not on view I sometimes get asked to go down to the cage (storage area) three times a day,” said Mr Butterfield. “They want to see the Homers, which I don’t mind doing. It is nice to know that people have attached themselves to them. I do hope this exhibit will bring people from overseas to come here to see what Bermuda now has to offer through this facility.”The new exhibition features a number of highlights from the Masterworks Collection including works by Homer, Ross Stirling Turner, Marsden Hartley, Bermuda tourism posters by artists such as Alfred Stieglitz, and Bermuda portraits by E Ambrose Webster, among others.Besides the artwork there’s always some special treat in a Masterworks exhibit. Last year their major exhibition included an actual vintage Austin car imported from England. In this exhibition the prize at the bottom of the cracker jack box might be late Bermudian musician Austin Talbot’s boat ‘The Booboo’. It is placed in front of a video taken out over the water that makes it look as though the boat is moving.There’s also a beautifully restored dinghy race game created and patented by Mr Butterfield’s grandfather many years ago, and lead soldiers made by Dr Harold Pestana called ‘Soldiers of the Queen’ portraying the Bermuda Militia Artillery (BMA) and the Bermuda Volunteer Rifle Corps (BVRC).The Masterworks Gallery is located in the old Arrowroot Factory at the Botanical Gardens. They credit former Premier Jennifer Smith with helping them to secure the premises which was otherwise destined for the wrecking ball. She was a volunteer with Masterworks at one time. When they first moved in, the ground floor was still a muddy fern garden that would regularly flood.“People thought we were nuts,” said curator Elise Outerbridge. “The really interesting thing is I don’t think either of us ever doubted for a moment that we would succeed. Maybe it was because we were so naive and enthusiastic, we never thought this was going to fail. When the Winslow Homer came up, it was never ‘we’re never going to get that’ it was ‘how do we get that’. When you look back, you think ‘what were we thinking at the time’.”In the beginning, naysayers complained that getting to the Botanical Gardens was inconvenient even though it was centrally located with acres of parking. So Mr Butterfield brought one of his benefactors to the gallery on the day of the Annual Exhibition and showed him the thousands of cars that were packed on the grounds of the Botanical Gardens. The point was taken.“I was amused that one of the complaints was that it was inconvenient,” said Mr Butterfield. “There could be no better location for us. We are really blessed.”Over the years they have seen their education programmes grow. They now have a dedicated education officer, Robyn DeSilva who organises art programmes including classes and camps for a range of ages as young as three-years-old.Mr Butterfield said over the next ten years they might like to grow more programmes for teenagers, as they are the future museum-goers. In the near future, they are looking forward to unveiling a statue of John Lennon, who was inspired by the Botanical Gardens to create his last album ‘Double Fantasy’. The statue has been designed by Bermudian artist Graham Foster. They will have a number of Lennon lithographs on exhibition at the museum.“In ten years time, I have to look at the idea of retirement,” said Mr Butterfield, 63. “I would love to be an ambassador here and help do shows. In ten years time if we haven’t brought people on board who want to run it and do the administration we have failed in our succession planning.”For more information see the Masterworks website at www.bermudamasterworks.com