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What's OnNews
Life for an intern inside the MuseumMonday 14 June 2010 Our new intern Danielle Acheampong from the USA is penning her own thoughts and experiences writing a blog focusing on her time in London for the next two months. In Londonland Danielle talks about adjusting to life living in London and her internship here at The Foundling Museum. For a sneak peek into her experiences and insider information about life here at the Museum follow the link to read Danielle's weekly updated blog: http://blogs.ups.edu/studyingabroad/category/danielle-acheampong-11/
LAUNCH OF PRIZE-WINNING PUBLIC ART “TOKENS” BY JOHN ALDUSMonday 14 June 2010 Known internationally for his work in public art installation, artist John Aldus won a highly prized commission in 2007 to create a permanent public work: Tokens. Seeking a piece of public art for Marchmont Street as part of the regeneration of Bloomsbury, the installation will be inaugurated on Monday 14 June 2010. The Tokens public installation was created from 20 known tokens saved by, and on display in the Foundling Museum. He 'translated' them into thought-provoking metal representations which have been embedded into the pavement along Marchmont Street.
The Foundling Museum features in Hello! magazineMonday 31 May 2010 The Smaratians held a special charity cocktail reception in our fabulous Foundling Museum on Tuesday 11 May. Our director, Lars Tharp, former This is Your Life host Michael Aspel and author Penny Juror were among the stars helping launch the £1 million Chad Varah Appeal, named in honour of the man who founded the 24 hour helpline that provides support for anyone in distress and at risk of suicide. See the event featured in this weeks Hello! magazine. The Foundling welcomes...Monday 24 May 2010 ...the wonderful Stephen Fry found some time today to visit us for a Gruel Lunch and a guided tour...squeezing it in between an appearance on This Morning, talking about Wagner and a trip to Wembley to comment the Premier League darts play off. By the way - 15-time world champion Phil Taylor beat James Wade with two nine-darts finishes! Lars Tharp, Katharine Hogg, Michaela Petermann and Mr Stephen Fry after a Gruel Lunch At The Foundling. The Foundling Museum says goodbye to Tracey's TeddyWednesday 12 May 2010 From January to May 2010 Tracey Emin’s tiny bronze cast of a Teddy Bear that a child has tossed or lost from a pram sat abandoned under a park bench in Brunswick Square. It survived through the winter’s winds, rain and snow, and more recently came to be frequently decorated and adorned with daisies. Part of the exhibition Mat Collishaw, Tracey Emin & Paula Rego: At the Foundling, the Teddy Bear had a touching story of separation to tell. It was an artwork that gripped a deep resonance within onlookers. Like the museums collection of poignant tokens, the Teddy Bear highlighted just one of the no doubt hundreds of stories ordinary folk have to tell and represented the subject matter that lies at the heart of the Foundling story; exploitation, loss, grief, sex, love, parenthood and childhood. It will be sadly missed.
2010 Foundling Fellows AnnouncedMonday 8 March 2010 The Foundling Museum announces Julian Lloyd Webber, Grayson Perry and Cerrie Burnell as the 2010 Foundling Fellows. Read more about this exciting initiative here.
Mat Collishaw, Tracey Emin & Paula Rego: At the Foundling: Editor's pick of the day video on guardian.co.ukWednesday 27 January 2010 until Sunday 9 May 2010 Hear about the exhibition in the artists' own words.
Children of a Lesser God, Mat Collishaw courtesy of artist and Haunch of Venison
Gruel goes back on the menu at the Foundling MuseumAnnounced on Tuesday 13 October 2009. The Foundling Museum, which tells the story of Britain's original home for abandoned children and London's first ever public art gallery, is to start serving gruel as part of its corporate functions. Located in the heart of London, within easy reach of the West End and the City, the Foundling Museum is putting gruel on its corporate hospitality menu from today. Special versions of the classic gruel have been devised by renowned chefs Allegra McEvedy, Tom Aikens, and Bompas & Parr. These original twists on the famous recipe will be served in the Coram Café throughout the Museum’s opening hours. Lars Tharp, Director of the Foundling and ceramics expert on the BBC’s Antiques Roadshow says: “Gruel was a staple meal for the foundlings; you can see it listed on a surviving menu in our Social History gallery! We’re bringing a bit of Dickens into the 21st Century and thanks to the wonderful support from the chefs we can bring a classic, if somewhat misunderstood meal bang up to date.” The Museum is home to fine eighteenth-century Rococo interiors, contemporary spaces and England's first public art collection featuring works donated by Hogarth and Gainsborough, amongst others, all of which provide a unique backdrop for exclusive entertaining and events. Born out of the generosity of philanthropists and the entertainment they enjoyed in the eighteenth and nineteenth century, events at the Foundling directly fund the Museum, making its story and art available to the public and supporting its education programme today. Janet Broadhurst, Events Manager at The Foundling says “The Foundling is such a great venue because it is so versatile with such a powerful story behind it. We can cater for a wide range of budgets and party sizes, and the unique and beautiful surroundings mean that The Foundling provides guests with an elegant, yet understated atmosphere, that’s not going to break the bank.” Ideal for all manner of corporate functions from seminars to client dinners, product launches to anniversaries, The Foundling events take place in the same galleries that are in use for visitors during the day. To book an event, contact Joanna Laird on 020 7841 3616 or email the events team at events@foundlingmuseum.org.uk Foundling Museum volunteers recognisedAnnounced on Wednesday 3 June 2009. The volunteer team of the Foundling Museum was recognized by the MLA & Renaissance London in the “London Volunteers in Museums Awards 2009”, as Runners Up Volunteer Team, with Shelley Mullane being Highly Commended in Supporting, Managing & Encouraging Volunteers. Lars Tharp Appointed Director of the Foundling MuseumAnnounced on Tuesday 15 July 2008. The Trustees of the Foundling Museum are delighted to announce that Lars Tharp has accepted the position of Director of the Foundling Museum. Lars takes over from Rhian Harris who has cared for the outstanding collections of art, music, period interiors and social history archives belonging to the childcare charity Coram since 1995. She has overseen the creation and development of a museum that opened to the public in 2004 and which promotes the story of the Foundling Hospital, the many thousands of children it cared for and the philanthropic vision of artists led by William Hogarth and George Frideric Handel. Rhian will take over from Diane Lees as Director of the V&A Museum of Childhood in Bethnal Green in September. Lars Tharp is a well-known figure in the art world having been a director and auctioneer at Sotheby’s, specialising in ceramics, and running his own consultancy Lars Tharp Ltd involved in devising and organizing a wide range of cultural activities and advising institutions and individuals. He is best known to the wider public as an expert on the hugely popular BBC 1 programme, The Antiques Road Show, for 21 years. Lars is an avid Hogarth enthusiast having established the Hogarth Group and has been a great supporter of the Foundling Museum from its inception. Dr Alan Borg, Chairman of the Trustees of the Foundling Museum said of the appointment “I am delighted to welcome Lars to the Foundling Museum. Rhian has done a wonderful job in establishing a truly world class Museum and Lars is inheriting a vibrant organisation which is set to have an extremely successful future under his direction.” Having accepted the Directorship, Lars said “I am thrilled and deeply honoured to have been appointed director of the Foundling Museum - one of London's most wonderful museums. For several years I have been deeply involved with promoting and discussing the life, works and times of William Hogarth; and for many years before that I was keenly involved in music. To be asked to join the modern-day successor to one of William Hogarth's very own, very dear projects, one where George Frideric Handel supervised the music, and one so strongly associated with the continuing charitable intentions of its founders, is a conjunction of personal interests which I could only have dreamed of. The team I'm joining, under its outgoing director, Rhian Harris and her trustees, has already been enormously successful in achieving the recognition this London jewel deserves. I now hope to add to their efforts by reinforcing its stature at home while drawing it to the further attention of visitors from beyond our shores. A visitor to the Foundling Museum will gain a unique insight into the way our values - and the lives of our children - have evolved over the last two hundred and seventy years.” Lars will officially take up his appointment on 1 October.
First Foundling Fellows announcedThe Foundling Museum announces Damon Albarn, Richard Wentworth and Jacqueline Wilson as the inaugural Foundling Fellows. Read more about this exciting initiative here. Foundling writer-in-residence appointedThe Foundling Museum, in association with UrbanWords, have recruited a writer-in-residence to work at the museum throughout October and November 2007. The poet Subhadassi will use the museum and its archives to inspire his own writing, and work with three groups of young people local to the museum, who will create their own writing and imagery based on the stories of the Foundling Museum. Subhadassi will be keeping a blog throughout his residency and a selection of writing created by the workshop participants will be published on the Foundling Museum website. The project will end with an early evening event as part of the Arrivals Festival on Thursday 22nd November. This project is funded by Create KX as part of the Arrivals Festival, celebrating the arrival of the Eurostar at St Pancras. The Guards march back to the FoundlingHogarth's famous painting, The March of the Guards to Finchley, returns to the Museum after almost a year away on tour. It has been a central part of the Tate's celebrated Hogarth retrospective, the first major Hogarth show for many years. It has been missed by staff, volunteers and visitors alike. RSVP: contemporary artists at the FoundlingFifteen contemporary artists have been invited to create works inspired by the art and social history collections at the Foundling. Their responses range from a wallpaper of children’s names, to a lollipop opera based on Handel’s Foundling Anthem. The exhibition, in partnership with Commissions East, will open in the autumn 2007. Rhian Harris, the director, sees the new works as “a powerful, contemporary counterpoint to the Foundling’s historic interiors. They will bring a new audience to the museum, who will be both excited by the exhibition and moved by the stories of the Foundling children and the people who came to their aid.” Foundling Museum volunteer is community heroThe Foundling's longstanding volunteer, Christine Newall, has been given an award naming her a Community Hero for the The motivation stated: "[Christine] is an energetic and enthusiastic woman who gives most of her time as a volunteer to cover 14 charities, for which she regularly gives guidance and support to the aged and assists visitors at the Foundling Museum." We could not agree more with the judges' excellent selection! Coram BoyThe Foundling Museum is delighted that the National Theatre is putting on a production of Coram Boy this year. The novel, winner of the Whitbread Children's Book Award, by well-known children's author Jamila Gavin is being adapted by Helen Edmundson and will have its world premiere in London and runs from 2 November. Coram Boy is the story of two eighteenth-century boys, one saved from a slave ship and the other an illegitimate son from a wealthy family, whose lives are intimately linked with the story of the Foundling Hospital. The Gulbenkian PrizeThe Foundling Museum was shortlisted for the prestigious Gulbenkian Prize for Museum of the Year 2005. The Museum was one of ten projects shortlisted from over sixty applications.
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What's Happening At The Foundling... in pictures...
Photo © Michicolor
Lars Tharp sharing the story of the Foundling Museum with guests at the Chad Varah Appeal.
Lars Tharp, Colin Coleman, Katharine Hogg, fom the Foundling Museum and Mr Stephen Fry. Photo © M. Petermann
Baby Things, Teddy Bear, 2008, bronze cast, by Tracey Emin. Photo © Pontus Rosén
Left to right: Lars Tharp, Grayson Perry, Julian Lloyd Webber & Cerrie Burnell at the 2010 Foundling Fellows ceremony, 2010, courtesy of photographer Daffyd Jones.
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King's Cross area. The award was given by 
Artist John Aldus at the launch of Tokens at the Foundling Museum. 
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