Both events were funded by Arts & Business and hosted by our main exhibition sponsor ING at its London Headquarters. You can read more about these exhibitions inside this issue.

In addition, we have also been developing our thinking on future educational activities, building our website and preparing for the main 2002 November exhibition at the Mall Galleries. To run alongside our main exhibition, we have also selected the theme of this year's debate which will be 'Corporate Art Collections - The Saviour or Death of Contemporary Art ?'.

In line with recent tradition, the debate will again be chaired by John Caine MBE. Unfortunately, this will be one of John's last functions as Chairman of Discerning Eye, as after the 2002 exhibition and five years in the post, he has decided to step down.

Although John will remain a director and trustee and therefore stay very much in touch with both the exhibition and charity, I would like to take this opportunity to thank him formally for all his efforts over the past five years. John's contribution to the development and progress of Discerning Eye, in particular our structural re-organisation and more recently our drive towards new and more varied activities, has been invaluable.

John remains a collector in his own right and I would also like to thank him for his regular £1,000 purchase prize (The Chairman's Prize) which he has awarded over the years and will be awarding again this year. In fact John is such a keen collector of domestic sized works and therefore a perfect example of a Discerning Eye buyer, we thought that it would be a nice idea to 'turn the tables' on him by inviting him to accept the challenge of becoming one of our six selectors for the 2003 Exhibition!

We also hope that in future years we may occasionally be able to tempt him out of retirement for the benefit of the annual debate which he has always presided over so skilfully.

To replace John as chairman, I am pleased to announce that the board was unanimous in its appointment of Robert (Bob) Benton. Bob is another lover of 'the arts' and, through his previous associations with a number of our sponsors and as a regular purchase prize contributor himself, is no stranger to Discerning Eye's 'raison d'etre'.

RECORD ENTRY FOR 2002 EXHIBITION
The Discerning Eye Exhibition has attracted
a record number of entries this year.
See page two for full story.

Bob is 45 years old and married with six children. He has spent his entire career in the City of London with a number of stockbroking firms and is currently Chief Executive of Bridgewell Securities Limited.

We are very much looking forward to Bob's involvement, so welcome and thanks for picking up the gauntlet!

 

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