Building a Legacy

For over 10 years, Ikon has been working in partnership with Marie-Louise von Motesiczky Charitable Trust to deliver its work with artists and communities. Having identified art and criminal justice as an area of charitable purpose, the Trust has been the sole funder of Art at HMP Grendon (2010-2026) modelling art education and providing exhibition opportunities at Ikon Gallery and HMP Grendon. On the closure of the Trust in June 2025, the total investment in Art at HMP Grendon is £1,257,977, significantly impacting the way visual art is perceived as part of a wider rehabilitation agenda across the prison service, whilst providing a cornerstone of Ikon’s artistic programme. 

A new publication, Building a Legacy (2025) gives an overview of the Marie-Louise von Motesiczky Charitable Trust between 1997–2025. Established by Marie-Louise von Motesiczky (1909 – 1996), the Trust has spent the first quarter of the 21st century securing the artist’s legacy through the distribution of her paintings – including many self-portraits, portraits and still lifes – to public and private collections in the UK, Europe and USA.

Taught by Max Beckmann (1884 – 1950) in the 1920s, von Motesiczky’s style of painting was Expressionist, reflecting the unconscious desires and collective anxieties of a period shaped by psychoanalytic theory. Further exhibitions, publications and archival research have developed the art historical context of a woman émigré artist who fled her home in Vienna as result of the Anschluss (the annexation of Austria into Nazi Germany in 1938), finding refuge in Britain in 1940 and becoming a British citizen in 1948.   

Following the sale of Marie-Louise von Motesiczky’s house in Hampstead, London in 2008, the Trust expanded its charitable giving to areas linked to the artist’s lived experience. Von Motesiczky became interested in the criminal justice system following visits to art classes at HMP Wormwood Scrubs. In 2010, the Trust began funding an artist residency programme at HMP Grendon; an all-male, Category B, psychotherapeutic community, established in early 1960s. Ikon was introduced to the programme at the end of the first artist residency by Lorna Giezot (2010–14), and has since produced residencies by artists Edmund Clark (2014–19). Dean Kelland (2019–23), James Lomax (2024) and Simon Harris (2024–25).

Each artist has created new work in response to the carceral environment and creative therapies of HMP Grendon through projects that often involve collaboration with staff and prisoners. They have also supported the development of the prisoners’ diverse artistic practices – in drawing, painting, printmaking, embroidery and sculpture – providing art materials, equipment, teaching and mentoring. The impact of the programme is described by Nick London, a former HMP Grendon prisoner and writer for Inside Time: 

“To positively effect real, lasting change in another person’s life is never a small feat. For a project to have done so profoundly, for me and many others, is nothing short of a wonder. Collectively you have taught me to see the world, and my place in it, in a new and essential way. I will always be grateful towards all who made my time doing Art at HMP Grendon such a joy and for them treating me as anything other than an equal.” 

In 2022, Ikon opened the Marie Louise von Motesiczky Studio at HMP Grendon, comprising a workshop and gallery space for the prisoners to create and curate their own exhibitions. Two years later, the Trust gifted two paintings by Marie-Louise von Motesiczky to HMP Grendon – Cook Attacked by Dragonflies (1950s) and The Hour (1967) – which are on permanent display in the prison’s visits centre. The paintings form part of this unique institutional context where the state of incarceration is addressed through art and psychoanalysis. 

Ikon would like to thank Frances Carey (Chair), Keir McGuinness (Trustee) and Sean Rainbird (Trustee) of the Marie-Louise von Motesiczky Charitable Trust for supporting our work at HMP Grendon. Over a ten year period, the project has impacted our own professional development, as producers and curators, providing a deep understanding of art pedagogy in prisons as a tool for social justice.    

Linzi Stauvers, Ikon Artistic Director (Education) 

James Latunji-Cockbill, Ikon Producer, Art in Prisons