Lease agreement secures Camden Art Centre’s future for 99 years

Artists and galleries have contributed to a £1.9m fundraising campaign enabling Camden Art Centre to buy the lease on its building for the next 99 years. The popular gallery in north London, which marks its 60th anniversary this year, has hosted exhibitions dedicated to artists such as Phyllida Barlow, Allison Katz and the 2025 Turner-prize nominee Mohammed Sami.

The building, which is owned by the London Borough of Camden local authority, was made available for the past 23 years on a peppercorn lease agreement. Martin Clark, the director of Camden Art Centre, tells The Art Newspaper: “It’s been just nine months since we quietly launched the campaign. Reaching the target so quickly is testament to how loved Camden Art Centre is and what an important part of the visual arts landscape it is, not just in London but internationally.”

Following Arts Council England funding cuts in 2022, it was important to create security and stability going forwards, Clark adds. “Buying the building was the first vital step towards that. During the eight years that I’ve been at Camden, it has been at the top of my to-do list. We got to a point with the council a year ago where they agreed that they would sell us the long lease, which was fantastic. There was urgency and a deadline [2027], which really focused us.”

At least half of the fundraising target was raised through contributions from artists and galleries, many of whom have had exhibitions at the centre over the past 20 or so years, Clark says. The other half comprises gifts from trusts, foundations and individuals.

Chantal Joffe, Alvaro Barrington and Kara Walker have supported the 60th Anniversary building acquisition fund, according to the centre’s website. The artist Antony Gormley confirmed that he had donated to the fundraising campaign. “I first exhibited work at Camden Art Centre in 1981 and the effect that the institution’s confidence in me had on my career was invaluable. This is what is so important about Camden Art Centre, it finds talent and brings it to the public,” Gormley said in a statement.

The UK gallerist Sadie Coles also welcomed the move, saying that “Camden Art Centre is for me a place of excellence: for the exhibition programme, the garden, the bookshop, and the ways it is both local and intimate, and an internationally recognised champion of artists.”

Richard Wright’s current exhibition at Camden Art Centre is his largest institutional show in the UK for more than 20 years. Baghdad-born Mohammed Sami’s show in 2023, The Point 0, was described as “utterly magnificent” in The Telegraph. Other artists shown at the centre include Hilma af Klint in 2006, Forrest Bess in 2022 and Martin Wong in 2023.