Early Christmas present of Treasures worth £40 million for the nation

13 Dec 2017 12:06 PM

Arts Council England yesterday published the 2016/17 Cultural Gifts Scheme and Acceptance in Lieu annual report.

It shows that in the last year, 44 cases – spanning a vast range of works of art worth £40 million - were accepted for the nation under the government’s Cultural Gifts Scheme and Acceptance in Lieu Scheme. Objects accepted through these schemes are allocated to public collections throughout the UK and are available for everyone to engage with and enjoy.

The Cultural Gifts Scheme enables UK taxpayers to donate important works of art, historic or scientific objects to the nation. Highlights include:

• The first cultural gift to the ss Great Britain Trust of over 850 items relating to one of the nation’s greatest engineers Isambard Kingdom Brunel and his family
• One of the most important donations to a UK museum of works by Fabergé including carved animals once belonging to Queen Alexandra
• A strikingly realistic Renaissance sculpture of a foot
• The first cultural gift to the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art of an important early Constructivist sculpture by Naum Gabo

Acceptance in Lieu allows those who have to pay Inheritance Tax or once of its earlier forms to do so by offering important works of art, historic or scientific objects to the nation. It has received the highest number of offers in the last year since the scheme began over 100 years ago. It has brought a great many treasures into public collections in 2016/17 including:

• The first offer in lieu to Durham Oriental museum of a Ming Dynasty sculpture of a bodhisattva (enlightened being);
• A masterpiece painted by John Singer Sargent when he was just 19 years old
• Two seminal sculptures from the 1960s by Sir Anthony Caro
• A tiara given by the Duke of Fife to his bride, Princess Louise
• A group of antiquities from Castle Howard, a magnificent historic house in the north of England
• The archive of former Labour Deputy Leader and Cabinet Minister Denis Healey
• The papers of the physiologist and pioneer in reproductive medicine, Sir Robert Edwards

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