Emily Fuggle (QMUL) - 2023-24 Students
e.j.fuggle@qmul.ac.uk

Facilitators, Curators and Administrators: the Women of the Ben Uri, 1915-1995

This project aims to write the first institutional history of the Ben Uri Gallery & Museum through the lens of its women administrators, principally, Ethel Solomon (1888-1985), Erna Auerbach (1897-1975), Alice Schwab (1915-2001) and Agi Katz (1937-2021), from its foundation as an Art Society in 1915 to its becoming a museum in 1995.

Since 1915, the Ben Uri has held a specific position in Britain’s cultural landscape as a nexus for circulations and transfers of people and ideas. This project will uncover the pivotal role that the women involved with Ben Uri have played in promoting, collecting, curating and disseminating art produced by Jewish and immigrant artists, as well as in shaping the Society’s image and mission. While substantial advances in history of art in the last fifty years have established scholarship on women artists as a major strand in the discipline, the role of women professionals in the art world – supporting, promoting, collecting and curating – still demands exploration. The thesis will address how, through their activities as commissioners and facilitators of opportunities and careers for an artistic community formed mainly of exiles and émigrés, these women administrators nurtured a space where different artist minorities (Jewish, émigré, women) could thrive.

Combining social history of art, exile studies, and gender studies, the thesis will
draw on the archives of Ben Uri as well as a range of complementary sources, including correspondence, artworks, press reviews, family interviews and collecting histories.

Emily is a Curator who has previously held roles at the Imperial War Museum, London South Bank University and the Jewish Museum New York.

Collaborative Partner: Ben Uri Gallery and Museum

Primary Supervisor: Dr Émilie Oléron Evans

Secondary Supervisor: Dr Chloe Ward

Collaborative Partner Supervisor: Sarah MacDougall