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I've written more on the National Trust's new strategy for @TheArtNewspaper. The cuts at curator level are worse than I feared.

ALL specialist curators are to go - books, furniture, paintings, sculpture, etc. (Thread, 1/)

theartnewspaper.com/comment/nation…
In the central ‘Curation and Experience’ team, about 79 posts have been summarily ‘closed’. These staff must now compete amongst each other for 53 new posts. 2/
Earlier this week @thetimes published details of the Trust's ‘Ten Year Vision Document’, which set out an ambition to ‘dial down’ the Trust's role as a ‘major national cultural institution’. 3/
thetimes.co.uk/article/nation…
In a letter to The Times, the @nationalTrust’s CEO Hilary McGrady said the Ten Year Vision document was purely ‘to provoke debate’. 4/
I'm not sure. Does axing specialist curators confirm the ‘dial down’ ambition? As I set out in @TheArtNewspaper, redundancy documents match the Vision agenda; ‘a differentiated approach’; reducing ‘extent of collections’; a new post, ‘Curator of Re-Purposing Country Houses’. 5/
Today, The Times reports internal concerns that the Trust 'is set on keeping only 20 of its properties continually open to the public'. 6/

thetimes.co.uk/article/nation…
Without seeking to deny the financial pressures the Trust faces, this is a vital moment in the Trust’s history. Anyone interested in the arts and heritage should help fight these reckless changes. Thanks for your support. 7/Ends.
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Bendor Grosvenor PhD
@arthistorynews
The new @nationaltrust '10 Year Vision' is truly alarming for built heritage. Less focus on art history, objects put into in storage, fewer curators, and the end of what it calls the 'outdated mansion experience'. (Thread)
thetimes.co.uk/article/nation…
I've seen the internal document referred to in The Times. It's written by the Trust's Visitor Experience Director, and is full of W1A-type talk. But the last two pages refer to country houses, and it's not good news. > Image
The document talks enthusiastically about 'revolutionary' change to its country house offering. A small number of 'treasure houses' (like Petworth) will continue more or less as now. But for others, it's; reduced opening times, fewer volunteers, and more stuff in storage. > Image
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Dr Bendor Grosvenor
@arthistorynews
One of my favourite pictures in the Old Master suctions was this Sebastiaen Vrancx, who painted battle scenes. At first it just seems a violent mess, but >
> it’s a powerful reflection on civilian suffering during war. The scene begins top left, with armoured troops attacking a village and its church, setting them ablaze and murdering the inhabitants.
The soldiers chase fleeing residents, and seize their belongings.
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Dr Bendor Grosvenor
@arthistorynews
1 - There's still a serious threat to move the statue of Emmeline Pankhurst away from the Houses of Parliament, thanks to the entirely misguided attempt to relocate it to @regentsuni. A few thoughts on how to stop it, and why we should >
2 - The statue was unveiled in 1930 by the then Prime Minister in Victoria Gardens. The whole point of its location was that it was by Parliament.
3 - In 1958, there was an attempt to move it further away from Parliament, in order to accommodate Rodin's 'Burghers of Calais'. But campaigners pointed out that putting more distance between the statue and Parliament would be a slight on the Pankhurst and the Suffragettes.
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