about digswell arts trust

Origins

The Digswell Arts Trust, which was formally inaugurated by Lady Mountbatten on 29th May 1957, was the brainchild of Henry Morris (1889- 1961), a revolutionary educationalist who, over 30 years as Director of Education for Cambridgeshire, had pioneered community colleges, education for life and the village college movement. Morris, a great enthusiast for the arts, had been appointed to the Ministry of Town and Country Planning in 1947 to advise on the cultural and leisure arrangements in the recently designated British New Towns. Morris was an art lover who passionately believed in art for people, who maintained that the artists was central and vital for the well being of society. Through his energy, dedication and influence he persuaded the Government and the Welwyn Garden City Development Corporation to establish a Trust for professional artists in Welwyn Garden City.

Digswell House, first home of the Digswell Arts Trust was a decayed Regency mansion with cottages and outbuildings on the edge of Welwyn Garden City. The Development Corporation agreed to restore the house for artists' accommodation, studios and workshops and lease it to the Trust at a modest rent, which would in turn reflect this public patronage in affordable rents for Fellows (as they became known).

The first artists moved in at the end of 1957 - six artists and their families were in residence by Christmas of that year. Nearly 150 artists were accommodated by the Trust over the next 27 years at Digswell House. Some became internationally famous: Hans Coper, Michael Andrews, John Brunsden, John Mills, James Butler, Peter Collingwood, Ralph Brown, Liz Fritsch, Lol Coxhill. Many other distinguished people - Henry Moore, Herbert Read, Bryan Robertson, Roland Penrose, Jane Drew, Jack Pritchard, Victor Margrie, etc., supported the Trust by becoming Trustees or in other important ways.

In the early 1980's the Government and the New Towns Commission adopted policies of a less socially engaged and philanthropic nature and the Trust was financially unable to continue at Digswell House which was sold for refurbishment a nd was divided into a number of separate apartments. The Trust was able to 'retreat' to the Attimore Hall Barn, a listed building dating back to the 17th century which had been used as a cow shed until the New Towns Commission had renovated it in the 1970s. The Trust had taken a lease on the Attimore Hall Barn for £25 a year in 1979 as additional studio space, and the Barn became the Trust's Welwyn Garden City base from 1984 until April 2006. By that time English Partnerships had taken over control of the former New Towns Commission buildings in Welwyn Garden City and planned to convert the Barn to housing. English Partnerships worked with the Trust to design a new purpose-built studio building on the site of the former forge in Digswell, on which the Trust took a 25 year lease in April 2006. In 1993 the Stevenage Borough Council kindly agreed to lease the Fairlands Valley Farmhouse to the Trust which nearly doubled the Trust's available studio space. In all the Trust now has space for about 30 artists.