News from the chapel

With Fists, it Kicks, it Bites
07August202018 Aug 2020
Art, News, Photography

With Fists, it Kicks, it Bites

The Royal College of Art and associated Fitzrovia galleries are delighted to announce the collaborative exhibition With Fists, It Kicks, It Bites. The exhibition by the 2020 graduating students of the RCA MA Photography course, will be divided across the physical gallery spaces of Edel Assanti, TJ Boulting and Webber Gallery, as well as the beautiful and historical location of The Fitzrovia Chapel. Coming together to support the emerging generation of artists, the galleries are thrilled to be able to present to the public the exciting, assertive and experimental work currently made. Following the COVID-19 pandemic, the RCA had to...

Artist Tom Croft Brings Portraits of NHS Heroes to Fitzrovia Chapel
28May202028 May 2020
Art, Community, News

Artist Tom Croft Brings Portraits of NHS Heroes to Fitzrovia Chapel

Artist Tom Croft has created a virtual exhibition (installed and scanned observing strict government guidelines) at the Fitzrovia Chapel showcasing portraits of NHS staff, created during the current crisis. The exhibition incorporates work by 15 artists, all members of the Contemporary British Portrait Painters (CBPP), which represents many of the top portrait painters living and working in the UK. The display, which is exclusively available online, was installed and scanned at the chapel. The virtual exhibition celebrates frontline workers through portraiture and will raise funds for NHS Charities Together, to help support to the ongoing COVID-19 relief effort. Portraits of...

From living room to chapel room
20May202020 May 2020
Architecture, Art, History

From living room to chapel room

We hope you’re all safe, healthy and happy at home. If you’re missing the chapel, however, we might have the perfect thing. As part of our programme of trying to bring the best of the chapel to you while we’re all staying more at home, we’ve added a beautiful 3D virtual tour on to our website. Click on the link here and experience the calm and beauty of the chapel from your living room. But wait, it’s also informative! As you virtually wander round the chapel, click on the coloured circles and find out historical or cultural snippets about the...

Revisit The Ward
03April20206 May 2020
Photography

Revisit The Ward

On the day the incredible Nightingale Hospital, built in just nine days to treat coronavirus patients , has opened in London, we also pay tribute to another hospital with an extraordinary purpose. When the chapel was part of the Middlesex Hospital, the Broderip and Charles Bell wards were some of the few dedicated AIDS wards that existed in London. Gideon Mendel‘s photographs from 1993 show how these wards became more like a second home and the staff and patients friends.  The Broderip was opened by Diana, Princess of Wales in 1987. This was the era before antiretroviral medications had become...

Faye Hughes to step down as the Fitzrovia Chapel’s artistic director in spring 2020
20March202020 Mar 2020
Community, News

Faye Hughes to step down as the Fitzrovia Chapel’s artistic director in spring 2020

Faye joined the chapel in the summer of 2016 as the its founding artistic director. In addition to her successes in establishing the chapel’s essential business strategy, including exciting and enduring partnerships with galleries, festivals and brands and as Westminster’s leading wedding venue, she designed and curated the cultural programme, Lineage. Lineage, which includes an annual exhibition, wireless audio events and heritage days, all root visitors in the strong sense of history within the Fitzrovia community. It has enabled exploration of cultural, sociological and historical influences of the chapel, the former hospital and Fitzrovia. The programme began the important work...

We’ll be shut for a while
17March202017 Mar 2020
News

We’ll be shut for a while

Dear Chapel Friends, The government advised us all yesterday that we should stop non-essential contact with others and unnecessary travel. They have also asked us to avoid social venues. As you know, this advice is in relation to the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. To help protect our visitors, staff, volunteers and the wider community, we have decided to close the chapel for open days, Season by Season and Wireless Contemplation events for the time being. This means our 25 March Women of Fitzrovia and 15 April Season by Season events will no longer go ahead. We will also be closed on...

Opens Days at the Chapel
18November201921 Nov 2019
Architecture, Community, Contemplation, History

Opens Days at the Chapel

Our Wednesday open days are a time for visitors to wander in to the chapel and absorb the history and beauty. A chance to step out of the city and into a place of calm and reflection. From February next year (with a break in January), they will also be a time to perhaps discover an object or book or listen to music or audio. While the chapel will remain an oasis of quiet and contemplation – and a building of architectural and historical interest – it will also be a place to surprise, delight and discover.

Telling the Truth about Nina Hamnett
09November201922 Jan 2020
Art

Telling the Truth about Nina Hamnett

In our autumn exhibition, Nina Hamnett – ‘Everybody was Furious’, we offer a rare glimpse at the life and legacy of former Fitzrovia resident, artist Nina Hamnett. The show displays six rarely exhibited sketches by the ‘Queen of Bohemia’ (kindly loaned from the museum in her home town of Tenby)  set under the chapel’s golden ceiling, a stone’s throw from her former homes and her local pub.

Nina Hamnett – a Simple Exhibition Celebrating a Complex Woman of Fitzrovia
26September201922 Jan 2020
Art, Literature

Nina Hamnett – a Simple Exhibition Celebrating a Complex Woman of Fitzrovia

The Fitzrovia Chapel presents a rare glimpse into the life and work of writer and artist Nina Hamnett through an intimate exhibition of rarely seen sketches. ‘Nina Hamnett — ‘Everybody was Furious’ explores this often-overlooked Welsh artist who is central to the creative and cultural legacy of Fitzrovia as well as the wider art scene. Influenced by her own writings and Fitzrovian myth, this is a simple exhibition about the work of a complex woman.  The exhibition includes a touching portrait of Nina’s niece, Rosemary Booth-Clibborn, aged 10, and a drawing which has never before been displayed in a public...

Artist Jonathan Baldock at the Fitzrovia Chapel for Frieze
20September201920 Sep 2019
Art

Artist Jonathan Baldock at the Fitzrovia Chapel for Frieze

Stephen Friedman Gallery will present work by artist Jonathan Baldock at the Fitzrovia Chapel this October. The exhibition, part of Frieze London and Frieze Masters, is called ‘My Biggest Fear Is That Someone Will Crawl Into It’. It is a large, interactive sculpture which visitors can climb into and then listen to recordings by the artist’s mother. The show runs from 2 to 5 October at the chapel and is free to enter. Credits: Jonathan Baldock, ‘My Biggest Fear Is That Someone Will Crawl Into It’, 2017. Mixed media; fabric, wood, bed, light bulb, 2.5 x 2.1 x 1.6m (8...

‘Will it Bring them to their Knees?’ The Fascinating Evolution of the Fitzrovia Chapel
16September201916 Sep 2019
Architecture, Art, Community, History

‘Will it Bring them to their Knees?’ The Fascinating Evolution of the Fitzrovia Chapel

In this article, we reflect on the fascinating life of the Middlesex Hospital’s chapel, moving from its days in the courtyard at the centre of the hospital though to its current iteration as a community arts space and events venue. The urban and social context of such a rare and unique place is key to understanding how best to put it to work for the community it serves –  and we share how the history  of the building and our experience as a part of the Fitzrovian community is hugely influenced by the creative and social opportunities in the area past and present....

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