Hannah Mary Rothschild (1962-)

Dame Hannah Mary Rothschild (b.1962) is the daughter of the late Nathaniel Charles (Jacob), 4th Lord Rothschild (1936-2024) and the late Serena Mary, Lady Rothschild (née Dunn) (1935-2019). She is a British filmmaker, businesswoman, author, and philanthropist.

Career

She attended St Paul's Girls' School and Marlborough College. She read Modern History at St Hilda's College, Oxford but left without gaining her history degree. Hannah Rothschild started her career as a researcher in the BBC's Music and Arts department in the mid-1980s, and quickly graduated to directing films for Saturday Review, Arena, and Omnibus, while initiating and making programmes for the series The Great Picture Chase and Relative Values. Together with Jake Auerbach she up Rothschild Auerbach Ltd., an independent film company, making documentaries for the BBC and others, including profiles of Frank Auerbach, Walter Sickert and R. B. Kitaj.

For BBC's Storyville series and HBO she produced The Jazz Baroness (2008), about her great-aunt, Baroness Pannonica de Koenigswarter and New York's jazz world, following a radio programme on the same subject. Inspired by the Storyville programme, wrote a biography, The Baroness: The Search for Nica the Rebellious Rothschild. Her documentaries and shorts have aired on the BBC, HBO, PBS, and others, and have been screened and won awards at Telluride, Tribecca, London, and Sheffield festivals. Her first novel, The Improbability of Love, was published in May 2015, and she has written for many publications. She is a non-executive director of RIT Capital Partners and Windmill Hill Asset Management.

In 1994, Hannah married William Lord Brookfield (b.1959); the couple have since separated. They have three daughters together. In 2018 Hannah was appointed CBE for services to the arts and charity, and in 2024, she was made a Dame for services to philanthropy in the arts, culture and charity sectors.

Philanthropy

Hannah Rothschild became a trustee of the National Gallery, London in 2009. In 2013, she became the liaison trustee for the Tate Gallery. In August 2015, she became the first woman to chair the National Gallery's board. In 2017, her term was extended by four years, however, she resigned from the position in June 2019, citing a wish to devote more time to writing and to her family's wide-ranging activities and philanthropic concerns.

She took over from her father as chair of Yad Hanadiv, her family’s charity dedicated to creating resources for advancing Israel in July 2018. Hannah is a trustee of The Rothschild Foundation, whose activities include preserving Waddesdon Manor in Buckinghamshire, on behalf of its owner, the National Trust. She has lectured on art and literature at the Getty Institute, Courtauld, the Royal Academy, the Hay Festival, and others. Hannah organised the Illuminated River project to light Central London's bridges, transforming the River Thames at night. The final bridge was lit in April 2021.