Marie-Louise von Motesiczky Charitable Trust

Company limited by guarantee registered in England and Wales (no. 7572024) and a registered charity (no.1140890)

The Marie-Louise von Motesiczky Charitable Trust was created as a trust by foundation document on 28 October, 1992, some four years before Marie-Louise died. It received charitable status on the 21 November, 1996 and was incorporated as a company limited by guarantee with charitable status in 2011. The creation of the trust was the vision of Marie-Louise to provide a vehicle after her death for the preservation and promotion of her work, and the charitable support of the arts and other objects as stated below. 

The greater part of her estate was left to the Charity, including the house at 6 Chesterford Gardens in Hampstead where she and her mother lived from 1960 onwards, and  the bulk of her artistic output – some 250 of her paintings, more than 2,000 drawings, including sketchbooks, a small group of work by her mentor and friend Max Beckmann, and a substantial family archive. Copyright in Marie-Louise’s work, artistic and literary, and in the literary work of her mother Henriette and brother Karl, was vested in the Marie-Louise von Motesiczky Charitable Trust.

The Charitable Objects of the Trust were defined as:

1) The advancement of education of the public in the fine arts particularly painting and sculpture by any means but primarily by:
a) arranging public exhibitions of paintings and works of art and in particular those by Marie-Louise von Motesiczky;
b) the publication of literary works about the life and works of artists including Marie-Louise von Motesiczky.

2) The relief of diseases and other medical conditions impairing vision by assisting with the payment of medical and other expenses incurred in the treatment and care of eyes, including but not limited to, the costs of patient care, support and assistance to enable sufferers to live independently.

3) The general purposes of such charitable bodies or for such other purposes as shall be exclusively charitable as the trustees may from time to time decide.

The original Trustees: Jeremy Adler (Chair), Richard Karplus, Sean Rainbird and David Scrase, spent the early years of the Charity ensuring the conservation, documentation, publication and exhibition of Marie-Louise’s work, in keeping with the first of the charitable objects. In 2008 the Board of Trustees comprising Julian Chadwick (Chair), Frances Carey, Sean Rainbird and David Scrase, sold the house in Chesterford Gardens which provided the means for expanding the range of charitable activity from 2010 onwards. By the latter part of 2018 the Trustees then serving: Frances Carey (Chair), Keir McGuinness, Sean Rainbird and David Scrase (d.2020) had begun to work towards spending out the Charity and disposing of the remaining works of art and archival material. This was completed by the end of 2024, leaving the first nine months of the calendar year 2025 for the final stages necessary for spending out, then applying to be removed from the register of charities by the Charity Commission.

Links to the Annual Reports and Accounts from 2016-2024 are given below and a full set of these can be consulted on the Charity Commission web site: https://www.gov.uk/find-charity-information

Download Annual Reports:

An overview of the what the Charity accomplished, how and why, will appear as Building a Legacy. The Marie-Louise von Motesiczky Charitable to be published at the beginning of June 2025. This will be available in hard copy through copyright libraries and some others, and for a select number of people and organisations closely associated with the Charity and Marie-Louise. The publication will be accessible to all as a searchable pdf through this web site from June 2025 until April 2026.