Clowns Gallery-Museum

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Clowns Gallery-Museum
Holy Trinity Church, Dalston in Hackney.JPG
Greater London UK location map 2.svg
Red pog.svg
Location within London
Established1959;66 years ago (1959)
LocationHoly Trinity Church, Dalston, England
Coordinates 51°32′39.6″N0°4′23.3″W / 51.544333°N 0.073139°W / 51.544333; -0.073139
TypeClowning museum
DirectorMattie Faint (Mattie the Clown)
Website clownsgallery.co.uk

The Clowns Gallery-Museum is a museum of clowning. Established in 1959, the collection contains costumes and props from famous clowns, as well as a reference library, [1] and is home to the Clown Egg Register.

Contents

History

The collection is split between the museum's two sites, Holy Trinity Church in Dalston, London, and Wookey Hole in Somerset, England. [2] The museum was established in 1959 in Dalston and the collection was split into a venue in Wookey Hole in 2007. The Dalston museum is situated in what was the vestry of the Holy Trinity Church. [3] It was threatened with closure in 2014 but remained in place. [4] The Wookey Hole museum is run by Gerry Cottle, vice president of Clowns International. [1] However, the Dalston museum consequently shut in 2019 due to health and safety issues, and remains closed, and the Wookey Hole collection is also in storage. [5] [6]

Clown Egg Register

The Clown Egg Register is an archive of painted ceramic and hen's eggs that serve as a record of individual clowns' personal make-up designs. [7] The clown egg tradition began in 1946, when Stan Bult, a chemist, and founder of Clowns International, took to drawing the faces of club members and famous clowns onto chicken eggs. [8] The egg gallery was created to forestall the possibility of accidental or intentional plagiarism: an unofficial rule prohibits any two clowns from sharing a single face paint design, with eggs providing a suitably head-shaped mannequin. Real eggs were originally used but were later replaced with ceramic eggs. [7] The collection is no longer open to the public. [6]

Painters

The eggs were painted by Bult himself until 1966, with 450 eggs painted. As these were all chicken eggs, most were broken, with only 24 remaining in the collection. Clowns International continued Bults register, with Janet Webb painting 76 between 1988 and 1994. Kate Stone painted 144 between 1995 and 2009. In addition to the original eggs she produced, she also reproduced 59 of Bult's eggs from photographs. Debbie Smith took over as egg artist between 2010 and 2023, before current egg artist Julie Proctor took over in 2023. [9]

References

  1. 1 2 "The Clowns Gallery-Museum's History". Clowns International. Archived from the original on 4 October 2015. Retrieved 3 October 2015.
  2. ↑ Taylor, Jeremy (12 July 2013). "First Person: Matthew Faint – 'I run the clown egg register'". Financial Times. Retrieved 3 October 2015.
  3. ↑ Adams, Tim (7 June 2015). "Send out the clowns: why are they losing popularity?". The Guardian. Retrieved 3 October 2015.
  4. ↑ Polyviou, Natasha (30 January 2015). "A matter of laugh and death: what to expect at the Joseph Grimaldi service". Time Out. Retrieved 3 October 2015.
  5. ↑ "Clown Museum and Gallery". Facebook. Retrieved 14 July 2025.
  6. 1 2 "Home". www.clownsgallery.co.uk. Retrieved 14 July 2025.
  7. 1 2 "Clowns Gallery-Museum London". Time Out London. Retrieved 19 April 2018.
  8. ↑ Fagundes, David; Perzanowski, Aaron (2019). "Clown Eggs". Notre Dame Law Review . 94 (3): 1313–1380.
  9. ↑ "Egg Registry | Clowns International". Clowns International. Retrieved 14 July 2025.
  10. ↑ Newman, Kim. "Stitches". Screen. Retrieved 14 July 2025.
  11. ↑ "s13e17 The Capilanos Criminal Minds". TV Show Transcripts. Retrieved 14 July 2025.
  12. ↑ https://badmachinery.com/comic/2021-03-03/
  13. ↑ Smith, David K. (5 May 2017). "LOOK - (stop me if you've heard this one) BUT THERE WERE THESE TWO FELLERS..." The Avengers Forever.
  14. ↑ Morrissey, Steve (1 March 2023). "The Avengers: Series 6, Episode 11 – Look – (Stop Me If You've Heard This One)…". MovieSteve.
  15. ↑ "The Avengers: Season 6 Episode 11 - Look- (Stop Me if You've Heard This One) but There Were These Two Fellers". Tubi. Tubi, Inc. Retrieved 23 July 2025.
  16. ↑ Pratchett, Terry (1993). Men at Arms. Victor Gollancz. ISBN   0-575-05503-0.
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