Daniel Caron, librarian and archivist of Canada, says the gallery has never been its own entity and has always been a program of Library and Archives Canada. (Steve Fischer/CBC)The Portrait Gallery of Canada will continue to exist even though its director has been removed, says Canada's official librarian and archivist.

"The status of the Portrait Gallery of Canada has not been changed," Daniel Caron, librarian and archivist of Canada, told reporters at a news conference in Ottawa on Thursday afternoon. "It continues to be an essential program of Library and Archives Canada and the collection continues to be accessible to all Canadians."

Caron was responding to an email circulated from former gallery director Lilly Koltun on Wednesday evening announcing that the Portrait Gallery of Canada would no longer be known under that name and would be folding into the programs branch of Library and Archives.

As part of that merger, it will no longer have a separate director, and Koltun will be reassigned. The gallery has had its own director and staff since it was founded under Jean Chrétien's Liberal government in 2001.

Caron insisted the gallery is not losing its name and has never been a separate entity.

"It's a program.…That's what it is and that's what it stays," he added.

The Portrait Gallery of Canada's collection includes tens of thousands of portraits of Canadians from all walks of life, gathered over centuries. Gallery staff had shown some of them by holding travelling exhibitions and tours of their vault while waiting for a permanent home.

The gallery will maintain all its resources and staff, except it will now be overseen by the director of the programs and services sector, Caron said. "It has been put together, so we're going to create synergies and in fact have more capacity."

He added that the gallery's new approach will be focused on partnerships with museums and art galleries and combined with innovative uses of new media to show the collection across Canada.

Decision on space 'made last year': Caron

When asked if that meant the gallery would never have its own physical space, Caron said, "Well, a decision was made last year, as you know."

Last November, the Conservative government announced it was not satisfied with any of the proposals generated in a competition to host the gallery and the project would not go ahead.

The email from Koltun shocked those who received it, such as Ottawa Centre NDP MP Paul Dewar.

"I couldn't believe it," Dewar said Thursday after reading the email that had also been sent to employees.

Those who supported the gallery worry the changes mean the collection won't get the attention it deserves.

"I just feel that it's a terrible mistake to sort of submerge it under the title of 'program,'" said Jerry Grey, an Ottawa artist and one of the founding members of Friends of the Portrait Gallery of Canada. She believes the structure of a gallery is needed to generate the kinds of vigorous programs that would allow the portraits to be seen by the public.

Dewar also worried about the effect of Koltun's departure. She had been one of the gallery's strongest advocates.

'Contrary to national interest'

The Portrait Gallery of Canada was originally scheduled to open in the historic former U.S. Embassy on Wellington Street, across from Parliament Hill, in 2005. (Canadian Press)Liberal Senator Jerry Grafstein, who has been involved in the national portrait gallery project from the beginning, heard the news through the media.

"In any other country in the world, this would be a national scandal," he said. "It's just political egotism at its highest and it's contrary to the national interest."

Portrait galleries exist in the U.K., the U.S. and Australia to display the people who were part of their history, and Grafstein described Canada's lack of a similar gallery as "a cultural shock and a cultural shame."

Grafstein brought forward a private member's bill in the Senate in November, supporting his original proposal for the gallery — that it be housed in the historic former U.S. Embassy on Wellington Street, across from Parliament Hill.

It was originally scheduled to open in 2005, but faced delays and cost overruns. In 2007, the Conservative government cancelled the plan and launched a nine-city competition to host the gallery as part of a public-private partnership.

Calgary, Edmonton and Ottawa ended up submitting bids in partnership with local developers.

However, in November 2008, Heritage Minister James Moore announced that none of the proposals received from developers was acceptable to the government. He said it was important for the government to act prudently in a time of economic instability and the project could not go ahead.

Grafstein and Dewar questioned the financial wisdom of scrapping plans to build a permanent gallery after so much money had been spent on the Wellington Street building and the nine-city competition.