Legal status | Registered charity |
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Headquarters | Watts Gallery Artist's Village |
Location | |
Website | www |
The De Morgan Foundation is a charity registered with the The Charity Commission For England And Wales, Registered Charity No. 310004.
The charitable objects of the Foundation are to safeguard, maintain and make available to the public the De Morgan Collection of paintings, ceramics, and other works of art made by Evelyn De Morgan and by William De Morgan and his associates, and other works of art in the collection, and to promote the appreciation of art and education in art and allied subjects.
The sole Trustee of the charity The De Morgan Foundation is The De Morgan Trustee Company Limited, Company Number: 06914254. The Foundation is managed by the Board of Directors of the Trustee Company.
The De Morgan Collection is owned by the De Morgan Foundation which enables public access to the works through a programme of loans and exhibitions as well as providing an online catalogue of works.
The collection comprises work by the late 19th and early 20th century ceramicist William De Morgan and his artist wife Evelyn De Morgan. They were both highly regarded in their fields and William De Morgan was a potter of the Arts & Crafts Movement, credited with the rediscovery of the art of lustre. His work was influenced by the Islamic tiles he saw at the South Kensington Museum.
The collection was formed by Evelyn De Morgan’s sister, Mrs. Wilhelmina Stirling, a supporter of the ideals of the Pre-Raphaelite movement, who also wrote several books under the name A.M.W. Stirling. She inherited some pieces from her sister and brother-in-law and actively sought out other works to add to her collection, which she displayed at her home, Old Battersea House.
Upon her death in 1965 she bequeathed her substantial art collection to be looked after in Trust. In the years following her death parts of the collection were displayed at a number of locations including Cardiff Castle, Cragside in Northumberland and Knightshayes Court in Devon, all of which have interiors from the years when the De Morgans were active. From 2002 until 28 June 2014, it was housed at the De Morgan Centre in the Victorian era Longstaff Reading Room of the former Wandsworth Library at West Hill in Wandsworth, in south west London, which dates from 1887.