The Courtauld has unveiled an £82m campus redevelopment it is calling a “once-in-a-generation transformation” of its Grade-I listed building, Somerset House, in London.
The Stirling prize-winning architects Witherford Watson Mann will take charge of the four-year project at the teaching and research centre and public gallery, which follows their 2021 revamp of the Courtauld Gallery space. The Courtauld Institute of Art is an independent college of the University of London, focusing on the teaching and research of art history.
Prof Mark Hallett, the Märit Rausing director of the Courtauld, said: “Our gallery is the most elegant and beautiful gallery in the UK and this next phase is about creating an amazing new campus for the academic institute while bringing everything back under one roof … It’s going to be something that’s really fit for the students of today.”
A rendering of the new Courtauld Institute entrance. Illustration: Secchi Smith
The renovation work will take place in the east wing of Somerset House, with the institute being newly connected to several townhouses on the Strand.
The work means the Courtauld’s teaching spaces, currently situated in King’s Cross, north London, will move to the same site as its gallery, creating what the institution is calling “a flexible, state-of-the-art campus and [securing] its legacy for the next 100 years”.
Research commissioned by the institution shows that over the past decade the number of UK schools offering A-level art history has fallen by 37%, from 122 in 2016 to 77. All of those are in England, with most in London and the south-east. Only 19 of the 77 are state schools.
Hallett said the institution planned to helpp schools that wanted to teach art history, although this project was in its early planning stages.
The late art historian and former director of the Courtauld Michael Kauffmann moved the institution from its “exquisite goldfish bowl in Portman Square” to Somerset House in the late 1980s. The gallery’s collection includes several masterpieces, such as Manet’s A Bar at the Folies-Bergère, Botticelli’s The Trinity With Saints and Van Gogh’s Self-Portrait With Bandaged Ear.
The move was a success, with student numbers almost doubling by the time Kauffman left six years later. Alumni include the British Museum director, Nicholas Cullinan, the Arts Council England chair, Sir Nicholas Serota, and the National Gallery chief, Gabriele Finaldi.
Michael Kauffmann in front of Somerset House.
Hallett said the renovation was the completion of Kauffmann’s original vision. “It’s revisiting what Michael wanted to see happening when he moved the Courtauld to Somerset House, but it’s making sure that we’re doing things at a really high level in terms of the environment we provide.”
The gallery was reopened in 2021 after a three-year, £57m renovation which the Observer described as “a masterclass in tasteful updating”.
Witherford Watson Mann recently won the Stirling prize for their Appleby Blue Almshouse housing complex in Southwark, London.
The overhaul of the Courtauld’s teaching spaces is being paid for by donations, including a record £30m from the Reuben Foundation, and from the Blavatnik Family Foundation, which gave £10m to the gallery in 2020.
