25 Years of the Genesis Foundation
5 January 2026
Today marks 25 years since the Genesis Foundation began its mission to support and nurture the development of outstanding emerging talent across theatre, choral music, visual arts, literature and so much more.
Here is a note from our Founder and Chairman, John Studzinski CBE:
25 years ago today, on 5 January 2001, the Genesis Foundation was registered as a charity.
Since that time, the Foundation has supported tens of thousands of artists and built long-term partnerships with some of the UK’s most vital cultural institutions, such as the Almeida Theatre, National Theatre, Royal Academy of Arts, Royal Court Theatre and The Sixteen.
Genesis has never been about quick wins or sending people out the door with a cheque. It has been about real support – for artists, ideas and institutions – long enough for talent to take root and for confidence to grow. The creation of art requires patience, trust and belief.
The word that sums this up for me is dignity. Dignity is giving people the tools and the time to create their work, not just the means to get by. This became even clearer to me during the pandemic, when we launched the £1 million Genesis Kickstart Fund to support freelancers in the arts who had lost their contracts effectively overnight, with no support structure in place. As Sir Simon Rattle said at the time, “The most important thing is not just to support the freelancers, but to actually give them real work.”
That belief has been at the heart of the Genesis Foundation from the very beginning. We want to give people the conditions in which they can achieve their creative potential. Art is not neat. It is experimental, uncertain, and sometimes it fails; that is not only acceptable, it is necessary. What matters is that artists feel supported enough to take risks, learn from what doesn’t work, and return stronger, clearer and closer to what they are trying to achieve.
As our anniversary year begins, I hope it will inspire more people to consider what they can do for the causes they are passionate about, to think long-term, and to recognise that no good thing is worth having unless it is shared. In 2026, working in partnership with visionary leaders and respected, forward-looking organisations in the cultural field, the Genesis Foundation will continue to build the skills and resources of outstanding creative professionals. As ever, our aim is to ensure that they will be able to share their exceptional talents with the world over the years and decades to come.
If you would like to contribute to the Genesis Foundation’s continued work in sustaining the arts, please follow this link to our donations page.
