Charitable donations - Rejuvenate Worldwide and St Francis Hospice

Each year commission4mission makes a donation to a chosen charity with the money donated having been raised through commissions and sales obtained in the preceding year. This year our committee members have asked that our annual donation - which amounts to £676 - be given to Rejuvenate Worldwide and St Francis Hospice.

Rejuvenate Worldwide is a non-denominational Christian charity working in the UK, Africa (Uganda) and other countries. Their vision is to give young people the opportunities to reach out to other across the world less fortunate than themselves. This vision is a pragmatic response linking the issues facing young people from deprived areas in the UK and people, mainly young people, in the developing world to help bring about hope and change in the lives of those we work with.

Saint Francis Hospice is a centre of excellence in the care of those with life limiting illnesses.  Their team of specialist consultants, doctors, nurses and health care assistants provide practical and emotional support for adults of all ages and give specialist bereavement support to family members from as young as 20 months. Their teams provide care in the home, inpatient care at the hospice, day care at our centre together with a full range of therapies and treatments.  This care extends beyond physical treatment of symptoms; we consider the emotional, psychological, spiritual and social needs of our patients, their families, children and carers.

Over the first four years of our existence we have been able to donate £5,612 to charities, with our earlier donations going to Haven House, Sightsavers International, Smile Train UK, and Safer Places.

Charitable donation - Safer Places

Each year commission4mission makes a donation to a chosen charity with the money donated having been raised through commissions and sales obtained in the preceding year. This year our committee members have asked that our annual donation - which this year amounts to £668.46 - go to Safer Places in support of their work with victims of domestic abuse.

Safer Places is an independent domestic abuse charity dedicated to supporting adults and children affected by domestic abuse. They are able to provide a wide range of services to support users and respond to individual needs and circumstances, whether it is in their refuge accommodation or in the community.
All their services work in a holistic and empowering way to help enable users to live independent lives free from domestic abuse.

Over the first three years of our existence we have been able to donate £4,936 to charities, with our earlier donations going to Haven House, Sightsavers International, and Smile Train UK.
 

Annual Report 2010/11

Rt. Revd. Stephen Cottrell, Bishop of Chelmsford launching the Art Trail for the Barking Episcopal Area

In our second full year of operation commission4mission has consolidated its initial achievements, reviewed its strategy, and maintained its growth and development.

During 2010/11 commission4mission has:

• researched, published and launched a Church Art Trail for the Barking Episcopal Area;

Pottery and paintings in our ‘Peacing Together One World’ exhibition at St Mary Magdalen, Billericay

• completed commissions for artworks at All Saints Hutton, St Peter’s Harold Wood, St Edmund’s Tyseley and St Pauls Goodmayes;

• gained commissions for artworks at All Saints Hutton, St John’s Seven Kings, and St Margaret’s Great Ilford;

• maintained a changing display of member’s work at All Saints West Ham and organised exhibitions at St Mary Magdalene Billericay, St Nicholas Rawreth and as part of the West Ham Festival;

• held a networking event and a performance evening and organised a launch event for the Barking Episcopal Area Art Trail;

• worked in partnership with CANA and Veritasse to create ‘Run With The Fire’, an international art project for the London 2012 Olympics;

• completed a strategic development review resulting in work commencing to gain charity registration for commission4mission;

• expanded our membership to 38 (as at 31/03/11) and were joined by Wendy McTernan as regional co-ordinator in South/West London; and

Jonathan Evens and Henry Shelton present the c4m cheque to staff of Haven House.

• presented a cheque for £2,700 to the Haven House Children’s Hospice, this being the charitable element from our first year of operation.

We are very grateful to: all members for their support and involvement; all committee members for their direction and guidance; our Patron, Bishop David, for his ideas and interest; Rev. Helen Gheorghiu Gould for her work on our Strategic Development Review; Mark and Matt Lewis for work on the Barking Episcopal Area Art Trail; Wendy McTernan who joined us as a Regional Co-ordinator; Ranjit Solomon for his independent examination of our accounts; and to London-over-the-Border for their generous financial support of the Barking Episcopal Area Art Trail project.

Revd. Jonathan Evens, Secretary – July 2011

2011's charitable donations

commission4mission has recently made its annual charitable donation accrued over the previous financial year from our commissions and sales.
Following our first full year of operation we were able to make a donation of £2,700 to the children's hospice, Haven House. This year we have been able to donate £1,568 split between Sightsavers International and the Smile Train UK.

Sightsavers International is a charity which works with partners to eliminate avoidable blindness and promote equality of opportunity for disabled people in the developing world.

The mission of Smile Train UK is focused on solving a single problem - cleft lip and palate - by providing free cleft surgery for millions of poor children in developing countries and free cleft-related training for doctors and medical professionals.

c4m artists news update (2)

The story of our charitable donation to the Haven House Children's Hospice features in the current edition of the Ilford Recorder and on the Neighbourhood Love webpage.

Peter Webb is currently exhibiting in the Spring exhibition of the National Society of Painters, Sculptors & Printmakers held in the Crypt of St Martin-in-the-Fields until 1st May.

The Illumined Way by Colin Burns features in From the Darkness ... light in contemporary art, a Brighton Festival Fringe exhibition (1 May – 23 May 2010) at Little St Peter's Church, Preston Park, Brighton.The curator of the exhibition is Nathaniel Hepburn, from Mascalls Gallery in Paddock Wood, West Kent. ‘From the Darkness’ is one of a series of exhibitions from Brighton to Canterbury including works by major international artists including Graham Sutherland, Stanley Spencer, Marc Chagall and Maggi Hambling.

The next Faith & Image event is The Spiritual Power of Drawing, an illustrated talk by Mark Lewis, exploring the drawings of the Renaissance period. There is no charge for this event, which will be held on Tuesday May 11th. 8.00pm, in the Gwinnell Room at St Mary's Woodford, but donations are welcome. Mark's talk will be followed on Friday, May 14th. at 10.30am by a visit to the British Museum to see the major exhibition: Fra Angelico to Leonardo: Italian Renaissance drawings. Meet on the steps of the main entrance of the British Museum, if you wish to attend.

Sarah Ollerenshaw currently features in the opening exhibition at The Moreton Gallery, which aims to promote the work of both established and emerging artists, showcasing talent particularly from the UK but also from around the world. Sarah is planning towards a solo show at St Peter’s Notting Hill and anticipates her work being included in Icon? The Art of Faith at Norwich Castle Museum and Art Gallery in the autumn. She has started Alder Fine Art with Emma Forrester to showcase their own work and to promote other quality, established and emerging artists. Alder Fine Art plan to be at the Cambridge Art Fair in June and Edinburgh Art Fair in November.

St John's Seven Kings is organising an Art & Music workshop on Saturday 29th May from 2.00 - 5.00pm. This workshop has been organised with local churches in preparation for this year's Our Community Festival and is open to all. The art workshop will be led by Mark Lewis and Peter Webb and will involve portrait and landscape drawing on the theme of local people and places. These will then be collaged into larger displays to be exhibited at St Paul's Goodmayes in the week of, and on the day of, the Our Community Festival. The music workshop will gather together and rehearse a singing group able to perform at the Our Community Festival. This workshop is being organised by Rev. Geoff Eze, curate at St John's Seven Kings. The art workshop is on a drop-in basis while, for the music workshop, we need participants to come at 2.00pm and remain for the whole session.

Valerie Dean will be having an exhibition of her paintings together with photographs by her husband Roger Dean in London during the month of June. The exhibition will be held at Pages of Hackney, 70 Lower Clapton Road, Hackney E5 0RN. There will be a private view on Saturday, 5 June from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. and they should be very happy to see you there. The exhibition will also be open in June during shop hours, which are Monday to Friday 11am - 7pm, Saturday 11am - 6pm and Sunday noon - 6pm. They look forward to seeing as many of us as possible at the private view. Valerie and Roger's work was recently seen together in a show of 16 Swale artists held at the Horsebridge Arts & Community Centre in Whitstable.

Current journalism from Jonathan Evens includes a obituary for the artist John Reilly in the Church Times, a review of the Resurrection exhibition at Bury St Edmonds to be published in the next edition of Art & Christianity, a response to an Artz Ville article on the Arts Centre Group website, and an interview with Catharine Pusey (then of the Employer's Forum on Belief) in the current edition of the Faith in Business Quarterly.

Harvey Bradley will be contributing work to the summer selling exhibition of work by members of Anglian Potters from Saturday 14 August to Wednesday 1 September in the Old Library, Emmanuel College, Cambridge. The exhibition will be open from 10am to 5pm (TBC). All are welcome, there is no admission charge. This will be an exhibition of work by over 50 members with the work on show covering the entire spectrum of ceramic art and pottery made in the region. Harvey is also involved with the Anglian Potters marquee at the Ickworth Park Wood Sale & Craft Fair, Ickworth Park Gardens on Saturday & Sunday 9 & 10th October.

Haven House Children's Hospice donation

Jonathan Evens and Henry Shelton present the commission4mission donation to staff at Haven House Children's Hospice

commission4mission exists to encourage the commissioning and placing of contemporary Christian art in churches, as a means of fundraising for charities and as a mission opportunity for our churches. The charitable element of our work is made possible because on each commission obtained by c4m the artist involved agrees to waive a portion of their fee in order that a charitable donation can be made from the overall price of the artwork.

As a result of commissions gained through our first year of operation, c4m has able to donate, from its 2009/10 income, just over £2,700 to charity. This donation has been given to the Haven House Children's Hospice and today c4m's Chair and Secretary, Henry Shelton and Jonathan Evens, visited Haven House to present the donation.

Haven House Children’s Hospice is a charity that provides on-going holistic care for children and young people with life-limiting conditions. They also embrace the needs of the child’s family from the point of diagnosis through to post death care. Their commitment is to enable children to live life as fully as possible in a warm, fun and caring environment. They care for children and young people between the ages of 0 to 19 who have life-limiting conditions and who are unlikely to reach adulthood. They help families by providing a range of services that include day, short break and end of life care, together with therapeutic play in the community. Families can find the support they need when they need it most at no cost to themselves.

Following the cheque presentation, Henry and Jonathan were given a tour of Haven House and saw for themselves the tremendous work done with children and their families and the many recent improvements made to the facilities and services provided. Haven House is a special place for special children and c4m is proud that be able to play a small part in the ongoing support of its services.