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How did we get here…..

Hiya all,

I’m Jo Digger. I’m the Collections Curator for The New Art Gallery Walsall. I thought I should fill you in on some of the background to the Epstein Archive and the project.

To try and sum it up (not an easy task):-

Back in 1972 Lady Kathleen Epstein gave the fantastic Garman Ryan Collection to Walsall. She was the wife of the sculptor Jacob Epstein and there are a lot of works by him in the collection plus more art works of and by their family, many of whom were artists in their own right, including their son in law, the painter Lucian Freud.

During the course of research into the collection in 1998, I was in contact with Jackie Epstein (Jacob Epstein’s youngest child) and his wife Isobel Epstein who had moved into the last house that Kathleen lived in Putney, London to look after family friend Beth Lipkin who had inherited the house and contents from Kathleen. In the process of sorting the house they came across many letters and documents relating to Epstein and The Garman Ryan Collection. Coincidently, we were developing The New Art Gallery Walsall at that time, with the Garman Ryan Collection at the heart of it, and Jackie and Isobel felt that Walsall would be the best place for the documents to go.

 Walsall finally took ownership of the documents in 2006 and we then started to search for funding to appoint an archivist to catalogue, sort and organise the archives. However we wanted the process to be creative and so decided to bring in an artist to work with the archivist on the whole project.

To cut a long story as short as possible – we then appointed the artist Bob and Roberta Smith to work on the 18 month project with funding through a joint Museums Libraries and Archives and Arts Council project called ‘New Ways of Curating’ and then were able to secure Heritage Lottery funding to appoint the archivist, Neil Lebeter through a project grant entitled ‘New Ways of Collaborating’.

They both started last week, on 9 September 2009, and within a day had started to bring the archive to the surface of The New Art Gallery Walsall with a display of artwork and archive material related to Theodore Garman, Epstein and Kathleen’s son and a painter in his own right.

We don’t know what the future will hold for the Epstein Archive but if last week is anything to go by the journey will be a fascinating one. We do know that it will result in a catalogued archive on line, public displays of the archives with artwork by Bob and Roberta Smith in some shape or form and educational tools for future use of the archives by formal and informal education and community groups.

Watch this space!

 Jo