CARA Art Auction

Jeremy Deller, Billy Childish, Maggi Hambling, Quentin Blake, Ralph Steadman, and Team Beswick & Pye are all involved in an art auction taking place in Notting Hill on the 5th of December. Cara have been defending academic freedom since 1933

Anne Lonsdale CBE explains why Cara matters... "Since May 1933, when Hitler closed the universities of Germany to Jews, the demands on CARA have never stopped. The invasion of Iraq in 2033 precipitated attacks on the universities and the professions in that unfortunate country which continue to this day; the restrictions under the Mugabe regime in Zimbabwe threaten the work of universities and the lives of their scholars; now there are problems for Syrian scholars both in Britain and abroad. The need goes on..." For more info: www.academic-refugees.org

Gordon Beswick and Harry Pye's contribution to the auction is a new painting called "William and Clem". William Beveridge, renowned as father of the welfare state, was also instrumental in rescuing persecuted scholars from Hitler and the Nazis. William was the founder of the Council for Assisting Refugee Academics (CARA), which has just celebrated it's 80th birthday. Clement Attlee is considered by many to be the 20th-century’s greatest prime minister. Clement became prime minister on 26 July 1945 as the leader of a Labour party that had won a landslide general election victory with a majority of 144 seats. His government was a transformational one. At home, the government created the welfare state and the National Health Service; abroad, it decolonised vast swathes of the British Empire, including India, and cemented Britain’s relationship with the United States. Billy Childish is contributing a wood cut to the auction

(Above image: "With Scout Under Rowan Tree"(2012) Billy Childish says: "I am donating work to the CARRA organisation auction because of my admiration for their tireless work standing up for citizens of many ethnic and religious back grounds who have been bullied and terrorised in their own countries by their own states. Organisations like CARRA offer a bench mark of humanity, and a voice to opressed people who deserve to enjoy freedoms that we are lucky enough to take for granted, but shouldn't." There will also be new work donated by top cartoonists such as Steven Appleby, Tony Husband, Martin Rowson, and Posy Simmonds.