By: Steven Kettle
Q&A with Steve Kettle, independent Trustee of the Norval Foundation and Head of Client Management for Stonehage Fleming Investment Management, London
I inherited my love for art from a client and my Stonehage Fleming Partners. I hadn’t been to a museum or gallery until my twenties and it wasn’t until my thirties that inspiration struck. I worked with a client who had a museum quality art collection in their home. She took the time to explain the collection. Around the same time Giuseppe began taking me to art galleries when we travelled together. He had long been a collector. I was hooked.
The mission of the Norval Foundation is to promote education through art. Above all, it was this that attracted me to the organisation. When I was growing up – in the neighbourhood in which the Norval Museum stands - there was little opportunity to visit a museum or gallery. Their goal is to give people who would not normally have access, an opportunity to learn about art. As an independent Trustee for the Norval Foundation, that is very rewarding.
Building an art collection is wholly different to investing in art. Collections comprise artworks that people wish to live with and which work together regardless of their value or potential value. The Stonehage Fleming Art Management team provides the fiduciary platform for significant collections. In the same way that we talk about the practical wisdom we bring from one client relationship to another, we also share our knowledge of art gained from different collections internally across the team.
Art can contribute to defining a purpose for a family’s wealth. People often fall in love with art and create a collection without much thought for what its cultural legacy might look like. Owning an art collection touches on so many succession issues – do you pass it on to the next generation, sell it, donate or loan it to a museum or establish your own foundation. Helping make and execute the correct plan for that family is the ultimate strategic leg in art management.
With the Norval Foundation, the Norval family are the founders and initial funders of the foundation. In this way a great sense of purpose has been achieved though the family’s cultural mission. Financial donations are used to secure the foundation for future generations. Stonehage Fleming were therefore proud to be one of the founding partners.
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Images © Copyright The Norval Foundation 2019. Yinka Shonibare CBE, Wind Scultpure SG (III), 2018. Photo by Dave Southwood and Courtesy Norval Foundation.
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