Exchange 1,000 Good Deeds Exchanged at the Foundling Museum Friday 14 June - Sunday 15 September 2013

Leading ceramic artist Clare Twomey has inscribed individual good deeds onto over 1,000 cups and saucers, encouraging visitors to undertake a deed in exchange for a unique site-specific installation commissioned for the Foundling Museum.

Twomey’s concept for her work, Exchange, is inspired by the acts of exchange and philanthropy that lie at the heart of the Foundling Hospital – the UK’s first children’s charity and England’s first public art gallery. Each day of the exhibition, ten people will be invited to choose a cup from the hundreds laid out on tables. In exchange for agreeing to complete the good deed, they may keep the cup. With each passing day as cups are removed, more deeds are revealed in the saucers left behind.

Ideas for good deeds have flooded in from local schools, former pupils of the Foundling Hospital, community groups, charities, the Museum’s 150 volunteers, and supporters from across the country, including actress Gillian Anderson; Director of Tate Britain Dr Penelope Curtis; presenter Paul Gambaccini; and journalists Krishnan Guru-Murthy and Jon Snow. The good deeds range from the simple (“Smile more”) to the challenging (“Don’t use any new plastic bags this year”); the familiar (“Buy a Big Issue”) to the imaginative (“Plant flowers on a strangers grave”).

As Exchange unfolds and transforms, the ways that people complete their good deeds will be revealed within the Foundling Museum and online. Dispersed beyond the walls of the Museum, the cups will act as mementos of good deeds done and an encouragement to do more.

Exchange highlights the role of artists such as William Hogarth, George Frideric Handel and Charles Dickens, in encouraging people to support the Hospital and improve the lives of others. The Foundling Museum, the home of creative philanthropy, celebrates their vision by enabling today’s artists to respond to their forebears’ extraordinary legacy.

The artist, Clare Twomey says: “The cups and saucers allude to the mass of institutional life in the Foundling Hospital. They act as a reminder of the domestic in a mass scale; of warmth and generosity and they hold an individualism that is revealed through the visitor’s interaction with the artwork. Visitors have to think about the sacrifice they will make and what they are prepared to do in this exchange.

For further information please contact; Rosanna Wollenberg David Lasserson Brunswick Arts Brunswick Arts T: 0207 936 1292 T: 02079361290 E: [email protected] E: [email protected] I hope the content of the work for each participant is personal and as they see their museum object in their homes, they remember what they did and where they did it.”

The Foundling Museum’s Director, Caro Howell says: “When mothers left their babies at the Foundling Hospital, they were making a heartbreaking exchange: the loss of a child for the hope of a better life. Twomey’s response to this central act of exchange is both power- ful and engaging. By linking the work of the Hospital with that of the Foundling Museum today, Exchange encourages us to follow the example of inspirational philanthropists like Thomas Coram, and reminds us of the many creative ways in which artists have helped improve the lives of others.”

Exchange is supported using public funding by the National Lottery through Arts Council England, with additional support from the Fidelio Charitable Trust, Emma Bridgewater and the Exchange exhibition Supporters’ Circle.

NOTES TO EDITORS

The Foundling Museum 40 Brunswick Square, Bloomsbury, London WC1N 1AZ T: +44 (0)20 7841 3600 E: [email protected] www.foundlingmuseum.org.uk Open: Tuesday – Saturday 10:00 – 17:00 and Sunday 11:00 – 17:00, closed on Mondays Admission: £7.50, concessions £5, National Trust members half price, children free Tube and train: Russell Square, King’s Cross St Pancras and Euston

Clare Twomey (b. 1968) is a British artist who lives and works in London. She works with clay in large-scale installations, sculpture and site-specific works. Over the past ten years she has exhibited at the Victoria and Albert Museum, Tate, Crafts Council, Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto, Japan, the Eden Project and the Royal Academy of Arts. Within these works Twomey has maintained her concerns with materials, craft practice and historic and social context

The Foundling Museum explores the history of the Foundling Hospital, and celebrates the ways in which artists of all disciplines have helped improve children’s lives for over 270 years. We do this through a dynamic programme of temporary exhibitions, collection displays, artists’ projects, concerts, events and learning activities for all ages.

The Foundling Hospital, which continues today as the children’s charity Coram, was established in 1739 by the philanthropist Captain Thomas Coram, as ‘a hospital for the maintenance and education of exposed and deserted young children’. Instrumental in helping Coram realise his vision were the artist William Hogarth who encouraged all the leading artists of the day to donate work, and the composer George Frideric Handel who gave annual benefit concerts of theMessiah . In doing so, they created London’s first public art gallery and set the template for the way that the arts could support philanthropy. The Foundling Museum celebrates their vision and continues their work, by enabling today’s artists, musicians and writers to work alongside vulnerable young people and to cast new light on the histories we tell.

For further information please contact; Rosanna Wollenberg David Lasserson Supported by Brunswick Arts Brunswick Arts T: 0207 936 1292 T: 02079361290 E: [email protected] E: [email protected]