Wellington - National Library

North, past other government buildings, is the National Library (opened 1987.) The nucleus of the national collection was formed by the Alexander Turnbull Library, previously kept in Turnbull's old house in Bowen Street, near the Beehive. The library now has over 250,000 volumes, including a very valuable and almost complete collection of accounts of travel and discovery in the south Pacific. In the fine Reading Room is a mural by the Maori artist Cliff Whiting depicting the separation of Mother Earth and Father Sky.