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The Upper Room (paintings)
Encyclopedia
Rhesus Macaque
The Rhesus macaque , also called the Rhesus monkey, is one of the best-known species of Old World monkeys. It is listed as Least Concern in the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species in view of its wide distribution, presumed large population, and its tolerance of a broad range of habitats...
monkeys by English
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
artist Chris Ofili
Chris Ofili
Chris Ofili is a Turner Prize winning British painter best known for artworks referencing aspects of his Nigerian heritage, particularly his incorporation of elephant dung. He was one of the Young British Artists, and is now based in Trinidad.-Early life:Ofilli was born in Manchester. He had a...
in a specially-designed room. It was bought by the Tate
Tate
-Places:*Tate, Georgia, a town in the United States*Tate County, Mississippi, a county in the United States*Táté, the Hungarian name for Totoi village, Sântimbru Commune, Alba County, Romania*Tate, Filipino word for States...
gallery in 2005 from the Victoria Miro Gallery
Victoria Miro Gallery
The Victoria Miro Gallery is a leading British contemporary art gallery in London, with an international reputation, run by Victoria Miro, one of the "grandes dames of the Britart scene", who first exhibited Chris Ofili and the Chapman Brothers...
and was the cause of a media furore after a campaign initiated by the Stuckist
Stuckism
Stuckism is an international art movement founded in 1999 by Billy Childish and Charles Thomson to promote figurative painting in opposition to conceptual art...
art group as Ofili was on the board of Tate trustees at the time of the purchase. In 2006 the Charity Commission
Charity Commission
The Charity Commission for England and Wales is the non-ministerial government department that regulates registered charities in England and Wales....
censured the Tate for the purchase, but did not revoke it.
The work
David Adjaye
David Adjaye OBE is a British architect.-Early life:David Adjaye was born in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. The son of a Ghanaian diplomat who has lived in Tanzania, Egypt, Yemen and Lebanon before moving to Britain at the age of nine, he led a privileged life and was privately educated...
holds the paintings. The room is approached through a dimly-lit corrridor, which is designed to give a sense of anticipation. There are thirteen paintings altogether, six along each of two long facing walls, and a larger one at the shorter far end wall.
Each painting depicts a monkey based around a different colour theme (grey, red, white etc.). The twelve smaller paintings show a monkey from the side and they are based on a 1957 Andy Warhol
Andy Warhol
Andrew Warhola , known as Andy Warhol, was an American painter, printmaker, and filmmaker who was a leading figure in the visual art movement known as pop art...
drawing. The larger monkey is depicted from the front. Each painting is individually spotlit in the otherwise darkened room. The room is designed to create an impressive and contemplative atmosphere.
The paintings each rest on two round lumps of elephant dung, treated and coated in resin. There is also a lump of the dung on each painting. Strictly speaking, each work is mixed media, comprising paint, resin, glitter, mapping pins and elephant dung. The Upper Room as a whole is described by the Tate as an "installation".
The Upper Room is a reference to the Biblical Last Supper of Jesus and his disciples, hence the thirteen paintings. Ofili states the work is not intended to be offensive, but rather to contrast the harmonious life of the monkeys with the travails of the human race.
Background
The work was first exhibited at the Victoria Miro GalleryVictoria Miro Gallery
The Victoria Miro Gallery is a leading British contemporary art gallery in London, with an international reputation, run by Victoria Miro, one of the "grandes dames of the Britart scene", who first exhibited Chris Ofili and the Chapman Brothers...
in a solo show Freedom One Day in 2002, when it generally received very favourable reviews, especially from Adrian Searle
Adrian Searle
Adrian Searle is the chief art critic of The Guardian newspaper in Britain, and has been writing for the paper since 1996. Previously he was a painter. He curates art shows and also writes fiction.-Career:...
, art critic of The Guardian
The Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
, who wrote, "It is certainly the bravest, and one of the most original works I have seen by a painter for years ... It would be a great pity to split The Upper Room apart, to sell the paintings one by one. The Tate should buy it."
Negotiations began between Victoria Miro and the Tate in 2002, but it was not until 2005 that the work was finally purchased. In July 2005 this was publicly announced as part of the new BP
BP
BP p.l.c. is a global oil and gas company headquartered in London, United Kingdom. It is the third-largest energy company and fourth-largest company in the world measured by revenues and one of the six oil and gas "supermajors"...
-sponsored rehang of Tate Britain
Tate Britain
Tate Britain is an art gallery situated on Millbank in London, and part of the Tate gallery network in Britain, with Tate Modern, Tate Liverpool and Tate St Ives. It is the oldest gallery in the network, opening in 1897. It houses a substantial collection of the works of J. M. W. Turner.-History:It...
. Again reviews were mostly favourable.
Controversy
In the same week as announcing the purchase, the Tate rejected a donation of 160 Stuckist paintings valued at £500,000 and was accused of "snubbing one of Britain’s foremost collections", by the Walker Art GalleryWalker Art Gallery
The Walker Art Gallery is an art gallery in Liverpool, which houses one of the largest art collections in England, outside of London. It is part of the National Museums Liverpool group, and is promoted as "the National Gallery of the North" because it is not a local or regional gallery but is part...
, where the work had been in The Stuckists Punk Victorian
The Stuckists Punk Victorian
The Stuckists Punk Victorian was the first national gallery exhibition of Stuckist art. It was held at the Walker Art Gallery and Lady Lever Art Gallery in Liverpool from 18 September 2004 to 20 February 2005, and was part of the 2004 Liverpool Biennial....
show. This led Stuckist co-founder Charles Thomson
Charles Thomson (artist)
Charles Thomson is an English artist, painter, poet and photographer. In the early 1980s he was a member of The Medway Poets. In 1999 he named and co-founded the Stuckists art movement with Billy Childish. He has curated Stuckist shows, organised demonstrations against the Turner Prize, run an art...
to investigate the trustees who had ratified the decision and he found that Ofili was one of them.
He applied to the Tate under the UK Freedom of Information Act 2000
Freedom of Information Act 2000
The Freedom of Information Act 2000 is an Act of Parliament of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that creates a public "right of access" to information held by public authorities. It is the implementation of freedom of information legislation in the United Kingdom on a national level...
, and the museum was forced to release previously-confidential trustee minutes relating to the purchase, as well as revealing that £100,000 had been donated by Tate Members towards it. The minutes showed that the Tate had begun negotiations with Ofili's dealer to purchase to The Upper Room when an un-named American collector was going to enter into a joint purchase with the museum. When this fell through, Ofili's dealer Victoria Miro
Victoria Miro Gallery
The Victoria Miro Gallery is a leading British contemporary art gallery in London, with an international reputation, run by Victoria Miro, one of the "grandes dames of the Britart scene", who first exhibited Chris Ofili and the Chapman Brothers...
then organised a consortium of five benefactors to donate half the purchase price, whilst also buying their own Ofili work privately. The Stuckists then led a media campaign over the Tate's purchase of The Upper Room.
The Daily Telegraph
The Daily Telegraph is a daily morning broadsheet newspaper distributed throughout the United Kingdom and internationally. The newspaper was founded by Arthur B...
published an article by their arts correspondent, Chris Hastings, with the heading, "Chris Ofili said artists should give work to the Tate for nothing... so why has he accepted £100,000 for one of his dung pictures?" It expressed criticism of the Tate's purchase, because Ofili was a serving trustee (which had not previously been mentioned in the press), and, furthermore, the previous year had urged other artists to donate work to the Tate because of a shortage of funds to buy new acquisitions.
There followed a series of articles in The Sunday Telegraph, as well as other newspapers, over the following few months, detailing more aspects of the purchase. Initially the Tate had attempted to reduce the price, but Miro refused: she said she had lowered it from the price she originally wanted of £750,000 to £600,000 (making £705,000, including VAT
Value added tax
A value added tax or value-added tax is a form of consumption tax. From the perspective of the buyer, it is a tax on the purchase price. From that of the seller, it is a tax only on the "value added" to a product, material or service, from an accounting point of view, by this stage of its...
).
The Sunday Telegraph obtained an email sent by Miro to Serota in November 2002:
- There is also extra pressure as Chris is getting married next week and I suspect he may be less willing than previously to wait for an extended period in terms of finance. Evidently, especially as Chris is a trustee, this is a sensitive situation, but if you could give me some indication as to which way to proceed, I will ensure that your decision is handled with discretion. Ideally I would still love the work to go to the Tate.
Serota said Miro would have to find half the cost, and she obtained £300,000 in donations towards the purchase from five anonymous private benefactors, several of whom were also buying their own Ofili work. The revelation of this arrangement caused questions to be raised in the press as to whether the private benefactors knew privileged information, and if they anticipated a profit through the increased value of Ofili's work after the Tate purchase.
Richard Dorment, art critic of The Daily Telegraph
The Daily Telegraph
The Daily Telegraph is a daily morning broadsheet newspaper distributed throughout the United Kingdom and internationally. The newspaper was founded by Arthur B...
, said The Upper Room was "one of the most important works of British art painted in the last 25 years," that the Tate had got "the bargain of the century," and "If you ask me, Miro and Ofili deserve medals for acting not in their own interests but for the public good." The Times
The Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...
said, "Victoria Miro, Mr Ofili’s dealer, appears to have driven a hard bargain with the Tate, which is the job of a clever dealer." Charles Thomson
Charles Thomson (artist)
Charles Thomson is an English artist, painter, poet and photographer. In the early 1980s he was a member of The Medway Poets. In 1999 he named and co-founded the Stuckists art movement with Billy Childish. He has curated Stuckist shows, organised demonstrations against the Turner Prize, run an art...
, co-founder of the Stuckists, said, "Sir Nicholas Serota mentions Victoria Miro's generosity in constructing this deal. Victoria Miro’s 'generosity' would seem to be in attracting benefactors who will give money to the Tate—so that the Tate can then give it back to her."
In September 2005, Serota wrote to the Department of Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS), assuring them that this purchase of a serving trustee's work was "exceptional" and had happened on only one other occasion. David Lee
David Lee (art critic)
David Lee is an outspoken, English, contemporary, art critic—condemning conceptual art in general and the Turner Prize in particular...
, editor of The Jackdaw magazine, showed that the Tate had acquired work by six serving artist trustees, in one case 50 works. The Art Newspaper
The Art Newspaper
The Art Newspaper is a monthly newspaper about the visual arts based in London.It is published in a newspaper, rather than a magazine, format...
pointed out that work had been acquired by every serving artist trustee during Serota's tenure. Official DCMS guidelines caution against commercial transactions with trustees: "even the perception of a conflict of interest in relation to a board member can be extremely damaging to the body’s reputation."
In December 2005, Serota admitted that he had filled in with false information an application form to the Art Fund
National Art Collections Fund
The Art Fund is an independent membership-based British charity, which raises funds to aid the acquisition of artworks for the nation. It gives grants and acts as a channel for many gifts and bequests, as well as lobbying on behalf of museums and galleries and their users...
(NACF) for a £75,000 grant towards buying the work. He had stated that the Tate had made no prior commitment to purchase the work, whereas they had in fact already paid a first instalment of £250,000 several months previously. He attributed this to "a failing in his head". Revelation of the application also raised the issue that the current chairman of NACF David Verey was until 2004 Chairman of the Tate Trustees. The NACF allowed the Tate to keep the grant.
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Turner Prize
The Turner Prize, named after the painter J. M. W. Turner, is an annual prize presented to a British visual artist under the age of 50. Awarding the prize is organised by the Tate gallery and staged at Tate Britain. Since its beginnings in 1984 it has become the United Kingdom's most publicised...
on December 6, 2005 against the purchase of The Upper Room with slogans such as "£25,000 Turner Prize, £705,000 Trustee Prize", and were approached by Serota, who became tense, according to Stuckist leader, Thomson. That evening in front of guests at the award ceremony in what has been described as a "moment of rare passion" and an "unusual, possibly unprecedented" move, he spoke out with "an angry defence" of the purchase, saying, "I defy anybody who has actually taken the time and trouble to see the work not to agree with the trustees' decision to acquire this most extraordinary and important piece of work."
Christopher McCall QC
Queen's Counsel
Queen's Counsel , known as King's Counsel during the reign of a male sovereign, are lawyers appointed by letters patent to be one of Her [or His] Majesty's Counsel learned in the law...
wrote to The Times
The Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...
alleging that the purchase of a trustee's work in these circumstances was a breach of the Charity laws. In addition to the problems concerning the purchase of the work, difficulties were also found in the display of the work. A leaked Tate Conservator's report mentioned (potential) damage due to the lighting level and that the work might have to be removed from display.It was out of commission for a short time, due to the lights not working properly.
The total sale price of The Upper Room was £705,000, costing the Tate £600,000 as VAT
Value added tax
A value added tax or value-added tax is a form of consumption tax. From the perspective of the buyer, it is a tax on the purchase price. From that of the seller, it is a tax only on the "value added" to a product, material or service, from an accounting point of view, by this stage of its...
could be reclaimed. The Stuckists have also pointed out that, during the period of the negotiations, works by the artist had suffered a decline in price, but had doubled after it.
Chris Ofili's term of office as a trustee expired in November 2005. He was replaced by Anish Kapoor
Anish Kapoor
Anish Kapoor CBE RA is a British sculptor of Indian birth. Born in Mumbai , Kapoor has lived and worked in London since the early 1970s when he moved to study art, first at the Hornsey College of Art and later at the Chelsea School of Art and Design.He represented Britain in the XLIV Venice...
.
In July 2006 the Charity Commission
Charity Commission
The Charity Commission for England and Wales is the non-ministerial government department that regulates registered charities in England and Wales....
completed an investigation into The Tate's purchase of Ofili and other trustees' work, censuring the gallery for acting outside its legal powers. It ruled the Tate had broken charity law (but not the criminal law) over the purchase and similar trustee purchases, including ones made before Serota's Directorship. The Daily Telegraph
The Daily Telegraph
The Daily Telegraph is a daily morning broadsheet newspaper distributed throughout the United Kingdom and internationally. The newspaper was founded by Arthur B...
called the verdict "one of the most serious indictments of the running of one of the nation's major cultural institutions in living memory."