Stephen Lawrence Gallery

During our visit to the Old Royal Naval College in Greenwich, we visited the Stephen Lawrence Gallery which was established in 2000. The gallery was named in honor of a young black teen who was stabbed at a bus stop. The boy’s mother was a university student and six years after the murder, was working at the university. In light of the tragedy, the university named the gallery space in honor of Stephen. The gallery was created to allow the creativity that was so evident in Stephen to live on through art showcased. The current exhibition during our visit was about the group of art studios that were prevalent in Greenwich from 1974-1994. This period was during the time when artists were beginning to group together in studios and take residence in abandoned industrial areas. The pieces on display were all works of art from a particular art studio and well-known studio artists. There were a variety of pieces, one of the most interesting to me was a sculpture piece of a polar bear by Richard Lawrence.

We learned about the art and artists themselves, but also about placing exhibitions, and developing and promoting exhibitions to the public. This is a task that librarians often forget about when they think about working in a library, but exhibitions are a prime feature in any library space.