Adapted from a talk by Hannah Savage, Enhanced Guide at York St. Mary’s.

York St Mary‘s has been a contemporary art venue for the past ten years. Our exhibitions vary from being site specific installations to showing works loaned from other galleries, including The Tate.

Our current exhibition is called Finding the Value and links in with York Art Gallery‘s major refurbishment, which could only go ahead due to Peter Madsen and his sister Karen Madsen who together donated an incredible £2 million to York Museums Trust.

In addition to this generous gift, Peter also gave his collection of paintings, prints, books and ethnographic items – a real eclectic range of objects that he collected at auction houses.

There were no constraints in the wills of Peter and Karen Madsen and York Museums Trust had free rein to do what they wished with the collection. So what do you do with it? It was decided to use the collection creatively and work with five artists who normally use recycled and pre-loved articles in their art.

The artists were invited to come along to St Mary’s and pick whatever items they wanted from the Madsen collection to create new installations, giving the objects a new lease of life.

They have all created very varied installations, each having viewed the collection in a different way – yet if there is a connection between them it is the concept of ‘mystery’, as we know very little about the Madsen’s and their lives.

You can hear Hannah’s full talk by visiting York St. Mary’s, or read more about the exhibition here.