Vivien Duffield

Dame Vivien Duffield, DBE (born 1946), is an English philanthropist.

Life and career

The daughter of millionaire businessman and philanthropist Sir Charles Clore and his wife, Francine (née Halphen),[1][2] Vivien Louise Duffield was educated at the Lycée Français, Heathfield School and Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford University where she read languages. She was for some years married, until their divorce, to British financier John Duffield, a Knightsbridge-based, London financier who is credited with building two fund management groups, Jupiter Fund Management and New Star Asset Management.[3] She has a brother, Alan Evelyn Clore. In 2005 she separated from her partner of 32 years, Sir Jocelyn Stevens, who was Managing Director of Express Newspapers and Chairman of English Heritage.

After her father's death in 1979, Dame Vivien Duffield assumed the Chairmanship of the Clore Foundations in the UK and in Israel. In the UK she also established her own Vivien Duffield Foundation in 1987, and the two foundations merged in 2000 to become the Clore Duffield Foundation.[4]

Dame Vivien’s UK Foundation has supported a wide range of organisations including the Royal Opera House, Tate, the Royal Ballet, the British Museum, the Natural History Museum, Dulwich Picture Gallery, the Southbank Centre and Eureka! The National Children’s Museum. The Foundation has made a particular contribution to cultural education, having funded dozens of Clore Learning Centres across the UK, and to leadership training, having launched the Clore Leadership Programme for the cultural sector in 2003 and the Clore Social Leadership Programme in 2008.[5]

In addition to the Chairmanship of her Foundation, Dame Vivien was a member of the Board of the Royal Opera House from 1990 to 2001 and is currently Chairman of the Royal Opera House Endowment Fund. She is a Director of the Southbank Centre board and a Governor of the Royal Ballet. From 2007 to 2010 she was Chair of the Campaign for Oxford University. She is the founder of JW3, London’s new Jewish Community Centre, which opened on the Finchley Road in October 2013.[6] She is also Chairman of the Clore Foundation in Israel.

A 2005 London Evening Standard article estimated that she and the Foundations she controls had donated in excess of £176 million. The same article quoted friends who described her as "a frightful bully, a very awkward customer", while she refers to herself as "bossy, arrogant and practically unemployable". In March 2011, amid heavy Government cuts on the arts, she donated £8.2 million for educational purposes to 11 leading arts institutions [7]

Honours

Dame Vivien’s charitable work has been formally acknowledged by many institutions, both in the UK and in Israel. She was awarded the CBE in 1989, the DBE in 2000 and in 2008 HRH The Prince of Wales presented Dame Vivien with one of the first Medals for Arts Philanthropy. The Medal celebrates individuals who support the arts and recognises the contribution of the most inspiring philanthropists in the UK. In 2006 Dame Vivien won the Beacon Fellowship Prize .

In February 2013 she was assessed as one of the 100 most powerful women in the United Kingdom by Woman's Hour on BBC Radio 4.[8]

References

  1. ↑ http://observer.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,6903,319327,00.html
  2. ↑ http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/dear-vivien-yours-desperately-vivien-clore-duffield-takes-out-her-index-cards-you-name-a-letter-she-suggests-take-c----she-continues-without-stopping-chelsea-physic-garden-childrens-legal-centre-contemporary-dance-trust----flicking-through-the-cards-at-random-she-mentions-the-ashmolean-the-national-gallery-and-the-v--a-1470440.html
  3. ↑ Daily Telegraph article on John Duffield
  4. ↑
  5. ↑
  6. ↑
  7. ↑ Duffield's philanthropic efforts
  8. ↑ BBC Radio 4, Woman's Hour Power list

External links

Newspaper articles and interviews