De Morgan Accounts
Today I received a copy of the De Morgan Foundation accounts for the year ending 31 December 2002, courtesy of the Charity Commission. They reveal that Evelyn de Morgan's Cadmus & Harmonia (shown) is one of the treasures held in trust by the De Morgan Foundation. So, what of the paintings worth an estimated £2m to £3m that were auctioned for £1.3m in 2001? After the auctioneers took their cut, the proceeds were £1.1m. Of this, £500,000 was transferred to the De Morgan Centre Ltd (Limited by guarantee: charity No. 1095374), leaving the De Morgan Foundation with an Inheritance Tax liability of more than £300,000! Sounds like a poor deal to me. And was the Foundation entitled to sell those paintings in the first place? My inference is that it was not. However, it is important to note that the Charity Commission is not "investigating" the De Morgan Foundation, but is helping it extricate itself from the muddle it has created.
posted by Unknown @ 7.11.07
2 comments
2 Comments:
This is valuable info, Coxsoft: Please keep the William Morris campaign informed about what you find.
Presumably the money raised went to fund the renovated gallery mentioned on the De Morgan website (which does not mention the impending move). So the beneficiary of the loss to the collection is Wandsworth Council, who have 3 out of 10 Trustees on the De Morgan Trust! Is this entirely accidental? What were the grounds for the De Morgan collection's enforced move? Do you know?
Did waltham forest think there would be some kind of payoff of this kind?
Best wishes mdj
Wow, that was a fast response! I've only just finished emailing this link to the save-our-museums campaign (to answer one of your questions), to BBC London News (Ramaa Sharma) and to Lorna Lee.
I'm sure the Foundation dangled a very juicy carrot in front of Waltham Forest Council, but I have no idea what this carrot is.
The transfer of £500,000 seems to have hit a major hiccup, and it could be that Wandsworth is losing patience with promises not kept.
The rent for the De Morgan Museum is only £5000 per annum, which is peanuts. Could be the Council wants hard cash, not promises.
Whatever the ins and outs of all this, the message to Waltham Forest Council must be "Don't touch it with a barge pole"! This is what I've suggested to Lorna Lee.
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