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Why I am donating £2.5m to the arts in the UK

Alex Lentati
Alex Lentati

My Foundation has spent 20 years funding Clore Learning Spaces in cultural organisations across the UK. These are places used for all types of education work. In London they range from the beautiful Clore Studio at the Donmar Warehouse to major learning ­centres at Tate Britain and Tate Modern. And in March they all closed their doors.

Very few of these are now welcoming visitors. Most of their host institutions have reopened, and I am fearful that the learning teams may be dispensed with. It is, I can see, the easiest function — along with catering and marketing — to set aside when the money has vanished. But we have taken years to build up these educational skills, with government and philanthropic ­support, and it would be scandalous to see all the effort go to waste.

Of course the learning teams did not cease their activities. Indeed there are many examples of new and ingenious ways of working that have emerged, from online workshops, to live streaming, to delivering art packs to families via foodbanks, to finding new ways to work with vulnerable groups. The buildings may be empty but most of the organisations are still delivering social and community benefits. Our JW3 Jewish cultural and community centre on the Finchley Road turned itself into an amazing foodbank, delivering 52,000 meals to people in need in Camden.

Today I am announcing £2.5 million of funding for this cultural learning and community work to develop and continue as we all contend with Covid-19. I give to the things I care about. It is vital that while necessary precautions are still preventing the normal working of all arts institutions, this cultural learning work must continue.

The Government’s long-awaited £1.57bn is slow in coming, and most people in the arts are suffering

I am reminded of something that Thomas Heatherwick once said when writing about our Clore Learning Spaces: “Ultimately, it is not the form or appearance of a studio — not the lights, floors, tables, sinks or taps in a workshop that matter, as much as the space between two people, talking to each other.” It’s this interaction that must continue — and if it has to be online for a while, let it be for the shortest time possible.

The Government’s long-awaited £1.57 billion is slow in coming, and most people in the arts are suffering — and indeed are fearful that they won’t have a job soon. This £2.5 million is a drop in the ocean, but it is at least here and available now.