Help Save the Arts

A new work by Turner Prize-winning artist Mark Wallinger is released today as part of a campaign supported by over 100 leading British artists against the government’s proposed funding cuts of the arts.

Mark Wallinger’s work shows a copy of Turner’s masterpiece, The Fighting Temeraire, 1839 by Joseph Mallord William Turner, in the collection of the National Gallery in London. A slash in the painting carries a notice “25% cut” and underneath the work a caption reads: “If 25% were slashed from arts funding the loss would be immeasurable.”

Turner referred to The Fighting Temeraire as "his darling", refusing to ever sell it until he finally donated it to the National Gallery. When the nation was asked by the BBC to nominate the greatest painting on show in the UK's museums and galleries it came first with 25% of the votes.

The title of Mark Wallinger’s new work is “Reckless”. He explains: “I describe the cuts as a reckless adventure. In fact temeraire means reckless in French and by removing the obsolete ship from the scene I am rendering the painting wreckless.

If you are working within the arts or support the in the arts in the UK then please this petition to the Government to try and prevent radical cuts to current levels of arts funding, which will decimate what has been one of the UK's chief success stories over the past 20 years.

The Prime Minister has pledged to take seriously any issue backed by a petition with 100,000 signatures.

www.savethearts.org.uk