Correspondence, diaries, manuscripts, speeches, newscuttings, photographs and official papers, mostly dating from the late 1920s to 1952. The bulk of the collection covers the last 25 years of MacDonald's life, when he was a Director of two State galleries, an art critic and protagonist in various disputes about modern painting. He was a prolific writer of essays, notes and lists and the notebooks form the largest category in the collection. There are a few papers relating to the Commonwealth Art Advisory Board and the National Art Gallery of New South Wales and more extensive papers on the National Gallery of Victoria. A few diaries have survived and also several files of personal correspondence.