The Courtauld Gallery

The Courtauld Institute of Art is delighted to announce that it has secured £9.4m from the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) towards Phase One of a major transformation programme, “Courtauld Connects”.

The Courtauld is the world’s leading centre for the study of art history, conservation and curating. Its Gallery is home to one of Britain’s most significant and best loved art collections, including its famous array of Impressionist and Post-Impressionist masterpieces.

With the generous support of the HLF, The Courtauld is poised to launch its biggest programme of development since moving to Somerset House in 1989.  Revitalising this splendid eighteenth-century building will make it possible for more people than ever before, and for publics of far greater diversity, to benefit from the full range of The Courtauld’s activities and resources – from its rich collections to its scholarship and its built heritage in Somerset House. The Courtauld Connects project will enable The Courtauld to assert its identity as a truly national resource, and in so doing to realise the vision of its founder Samuel Courtauld, that art is and must be for all.

“Courtauld Connects” overall will be a £50m project. Phase One will focus on The Courtauld’s collection and built heritage, its conservation work and its public engagement, both in Somerset House and nationally.

The HLF award is the latest in a series of generous donations to the project and brings the income raised to date to £18.4m of the £30m needed for Phase One.  It enables The Courtauld to progress with its planning, fundraising and delivery of Phase One, with its significant public benefits:

• Additional space for the display of The Courtauld Gallery’s growing permanent collection
• The Great Room restored and represented as the culmination of the visitor experience
• Improved presentation of the collection in the historic Fine Rooms
• A new temporary exhibition space
• A remodelled entrance that will enable all visitors to access The Courtauld Gallery comfortably and will improve general access to Somerset House
• Improved and enlarged visitor facilities
• A new Learning Centre which will double the number of school children, families and community groups which can use The Courtauld’s facilities
• Newly integrated back of house facilities for storage and art handling and improved spaces for The Courtauld’s Department of Conservation and Technology.

Additionally, the project will include:

• An online archive of 1.1m images from The Courtauld’s extensive image collection with a crowd-sourcing programme involving 10,000 people
• The creation of a digital resource capturing visual and documentary sources about Somerset House
• A new Public Research Forum that will provide audiences nationally and internationally with a platform for debate and share knowledge about topical issues in the arts.

And:

• A significant new partnership programme with 13 organisations across the country.

“Courtauld Connects” actively seeks to reconnect The Courtauld to the people of the towns and cities where Courtaulds Ltd once had a major industrial presence, including Coventry, Preston, Belfast, Braintree, Bolton, Holywell in Wales and Norwich.  Building on this focus with people and place, these collaborative partnerships will involve loans and skill exchange programmes with museums and educational institutions and will capture and celebrate the unrecorded heritage of the people who worked in Courtaulds’ textile businesses.

The Courtauld has already initiated a pilot project with the Herbert Art Gallery and Museum in Coventry, with which it has shared an important group of Impressionist works by Edgar Degas.  Vase of Flowers by Claude Monet will travel to the Harris Museum and Art Gallery in Preston and Dejeuner sur l’Herbe by Edouard Manet will also be lent to the Ferens Art Gallery in Hull as part of the Hull UK City of Culture 2017.

Phase Two of “Courtauld Connects” will be a £20m programme, which aims to provide state of the art facilities for research, learning and teaching.

The Courtauld is delighted to be working with Stirling Prize-winning architects, Witherford Watson Mann on the project. They are developing a masterplan that works with the grain of the historic building to carefully restore important spaces whilst transforming the public’s access and experience of The Courtauld’s activities.

Professor Deborah Swallow, Märit RausingDirector, The Courtauld, said:

“We are delighted to receive the Heritage Lottery Fund award which enables us to progress with our plans for Phase One of Courtauld Connects. We are taking Samuel Courtauld’s vision of art for all and reimagining The Courtauld for the 21^st Century so that new audiences around the world can benefit from our work and his legacy.

“This is only the first phase; there is still much to do and we have further funds to raise. But as we embark on the elements of Phase One, we want to share our exciting plans for the future. We are hugely grateful to the HLF for its generous support for Courtauld Connects and its endorsement of our commitment to making our academic excellence and rich collection available to as many people as possible.” 

Stuart Hobley, Head of HLF London, said: "The Courtauld is home to one of the most outstanding art collections in Britain; our funding will help to unlock these treasures by revitalising the “gateway” of its Somerset House site and re-energising their work with communities outside the capital.  We were particularly impressed with plans for a Learning Centre to host programmes tailored for children and young people.  What better way to thank National Lottery players than by bringing back Samuel Courtauld’s vision of ‘art for all’!”

Sir Nicholas Serota, Director, Tate and Courtauld alumnus, said: “The Courtauld is a world class teaching institution allied to an outstanding collection. “Courtauld Connects” is a bold venture that will open the resources of both parts of The Courtauld to new audiences in London, nationally and internationally.  The improvements to the galleries and public facilities have been designed by architects with a deep sympathy for art and the needs of audiences. Overall, “Courtauld Connects” is an exciting contemporary expression of Samuel Courtauld's belief that 'art is for the people'.

Gary Hall, Chief Executive Culture Coventry, said: “We are delighted to be forming a link with The Courtauld. Courtaulds was a major employer in Coventry so it is exciting now to be receiving a cultural benefit from that legacy. The loan of Degas’ Dancers to the Herbert Art Gallery has been exceptionally well received locally, illustrating the significant interest for these loans so we look forward to working with the Courtauld team on further projects.”

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 Notes to Editors

About The Courtauld Institute of Art

The Courtauld is the world’s leading centre for the study of art history, conservation and curating and is home to one of Britain’s most significant collections of art.  It is the smallest, most specialised university in the UK. Its 549 undergraduate and postgraduate students make it the largest department of art history and conservation in the country and its 7,166 graduates number some of the most influential leaders in the art world.  The most recent national Research Excellence Framework assessment awarded The Courtauld the highest rating among all history of art departments.  The Guardian has ranked The Courtauld first for the study of art history in its 2017 University League Table.

The work of The Courtauld’s internationally-renowned academics ranges from studying the interaction of new technologies with the contemporary art world to preventing deteriorationof ancient artefacts.  As a world-renowned training centre for conservation, The Courtauld and its conservation staff have the highest standards of knowledge and practical skills.  It is a special feature that conservation students learn alongside Gallery staff in the context of a working museum environment.  The Courtauld’s international symposia bring colleagues from across the world to participate and collaborate in its scholarship.

The Courtauld Gallery is at the heart of the Courtauld Institute of Art and is one of London’s must-see art museums. Its collection ranges from the early Renaissance to the 20th century and beyond. It is displayed in the elegant setting of Somerset House, one of the city’s most dynamic cultural venues. The Courtauld Gallery is renowned for its unrivalled Impressionist and Post-Impressionist paintings, including masterpieces by Monet, Van Gogh and Gauguin and the largest collection of Cézannes in the UK.

The Courtauld Gallery

The holdings of Impressionist and Post-Impressionist works given by Samuel Courtauld are celebrated as the finest in the UK. They include such singular masterpieces as Manet's A Bar at the Folies-Bergère, Van Gogh's Self-Portrait with Bandaged Ear and Renoir’s La Loge. The Courtauld’s group of works by Cézanne, the largest in the UK, includes such masterpieces as The Card Players and Montagne St. Victoire.  Other highlights include two of Gauguin’s greatest Tahitian paintings, Te Rerioa and Nevermore. Degas and Renoir are both represented in depth.  There are major landscapes by Monet, Van Gogh and Seurat, as well as celebrated paintings by Toulouse-Lautrec and Modigliani.  The collection extends into the 20thC with Kokoschka’s monumental Prometheus Triptych.  The wide-ranging collection of Old Master paintings includes an outstanding group of early Renaissance works from both northern and southern Europe; paintings by Botticelli and Lucas Cranach; two exceptionally rare oils by Pieter Bruegel the Elder; an extensive collection of thirty works by Rubens, oil sketches by Tiepolo, and portraits by Goya, Gainsborough and others. 

The collection of some 7,000 drawings is outstanding in both its highlights and its sustained depth and quality. All the major national schools of European drawing are extensively represented.  The holdings include master drawings by Leonardo, Durer, Pieter Bruegel the Elder and Goya; multiple sheets by Michelangelo and Rembrandt; more than 30 drawings by both Guercino and Turner, and important examples by Cézanne, Picasso and Matisse.  The collection includes 24,000 prints. Of further importance are the holdings of decorative arts and sculpture.  Amongst these is an outstanding group of Gothic ivories, Renaissance maiolica, exceptional Islamic metalwork, and sculpture, including one of only two marble carvings by Gauguin.

The Courtauld’s Photographic Archives

The collections described form a key element of the project. They are an original, almost wholly-unpublished collection of prints and negatives of international importance:

* The Conway Library – over one million images of world architecture and sculpture dating from the inception of photography to the present day, including detailed coverage of towns and villages across the UK and Europe.

* The Anthony Kersting Archive - architecture of European countries, Asia, New Zealand, the Middle and Far East, including an important group of Islamic architecture and associated communities.

* The Laib Collection - plate negatives illustrating works by major artists working in Britain between 1900 and 1945: from society portraitists to young contemporaries.

*The Witt Library -  a collection of approximately two million reproductions after paintings, drawings and prints by ca 70,000 western artists, covering the period 1200 to the present day with major artists represented in depth and unparalleled coverage of lesser-known artists.

The foundation of The Courtauld

The Courtauld was founded in 1932 through the philanthropic efforts of the industrialist and art collector Samuel Courtauld, diplomat and collector Lord Lee of Fareham, and lawyer/art historian Sir Robert Witt.  The Courtauld Gallery houses the art collection owned by the Samuel Courtauld Trust and is formed largely through donations and bequests.  The main collections comprise The Samuel Courtauld Trust Collection (c.33,000 items) and the Photographic Archives (c.3.2m images). The Courtauld family have made a significant contribution to the UK heritage over the centuries. They were descendants of Huguenot refugees who settled in London and developed, over several generations, a highly-regarded goldsmithing business.  The family textile business was founded by George Courtauld in 1794 and innovated and flourished until well into the second half of the 20th Century. Its factories were located across the UK and around the world.

The Courtauld at Somerset House

The Courtauld has been located in Somerset House for over twenty-five years.  It is situated on the south side of the Strand in central London and within the Strand Conservation Area. The buildings, originally the site of a Tudor palace, were designed in 1776 by Sir William Chambers as offices for the Navy, the Revenue, other government offices and the great academic institutions - the Royal Society, the Antiquaries and the Royal Academy. The Courtauld occupies the North Block of Somerset House which was these institutions’ original home. A highlight of the building is the Royal Academy’s Great Room, described by Joseph Baretti (1719-89) as ‘undoubtedly the finest gallery for displaying pictures so far built’. 

For further information please contact Michael Sherry, Head of Marketing and Communications, The Courtauld Institute of Art on:

Tel:  (020) 3751 0536;

Email: michael.sherry@courtauld.ac.uk

About the Heritage Lottery Fund

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Visit: www.hlf.org.uk @heritagelottery.

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