DE LA WARR PAVILION AWARDED £202,000 FOR DEVELOPMENT OF CREATIVITY AND SKILLS FOR YOUNG PEOPLE IN SIDLEY

The De La Warr Pavilion is delighted to announce CREATIVE SIDLEY – a 3-year youth and community-led project funded by Esmée Fairbairn Foundation under their Creative, Confident Communities work.

Inspired by almost a decade of working with and listening to young people and families in Sidley, the Creative Sidley Project centres on young people becoming leaders, designing and implementing a creative programme with artists and taking ownership of their community’s creative future. It is based on consultation with Sidley’s young people who wish to improve their environment and make Sidley a better place to live.

Heart of Sidley and the De La Warr Pavilion are partners in Rother District Council’s £19 million Levelling Up Award for community, creativity and skills in Bexhill. £2m of this will fund the new Community Hub in Sidley Recreation Ground and provide increased opportunities for residents to develop their skills and access education and employment.

The Creative Sidley Project brings together key partners in Sidley who share the De La Warr Pavilion’s vision that creativity and skills can transform a community and work to support young people. It will bring artists on to Sidley High Street and into community spaces to co-curate, with young people, creative programmes and activities.

The partners are Heart of Sidley, The Pelham, The Sara Lee Trust, Earls Mercantile Café, Beeching Road Studios, Talent Accelerator and 18 Hours Events. These Partners will work with us in their existing spaces to accommodate creative activities before the new Sidley Community Hub becomes operational.

Stewart Drew, CEO of the De La Warr Pavilion said:

We are thrilled to announce this investment in Sidley, thanks to Esmée Fairbairn Foundation. Sidley is full of amazing people who want to help create a better future for their young people and we are privileged to be working with them. The goal will be to create a dynamic, youth-led creative programme in the new Community Hub, re-inforcing our relationship with Heart of Sidley and our commitment to improving the opportunities of young people in our area.

Jay Carroll, Chair of Heart of Sidley Partnership, said:

We are extremely proud of our strong links with the Pavilion which, over a number of years have been so beneficial for Sidley and wider community. This investment in Sidley’s young people will feed into Levelling Up ambitions for the new Community Hub, enabling local Sidley residents to gain

access to creative and aspirational opportunities. We are very excited to be part of this new partnership and the future of our young people. For further information on our Levelling Up Award see https://www.dlwp.com/luf/

 

NOTES

De La Warr Pavilion

The De La Warr Pavilion (DLWP) is a centre for arts and culture in an iconic modernist building by the sea, designed by refugee Erich Mendelsohn and émigré Serge Chermayeff. It opened in 1935 as the ‘people’s palace for art and culture’ and now produces an innovative and integrated cultural programme of exhibitions and learning programmes as well as a diverse and popular programme of live music and comedy.

The Pavilion takes the lead in the development of cultural tourism and skills in the region and plays a central role in the cultural and economic growth in Sussex. For more information visit www.dlwp.com

 

Heart of Sidley (Big Local)

Heart of Sidley is a Big Local area. 10 years ago, they were awarded £1milllion by Local Trust to make a massive and lasting positive difference to the Sidley community. The Heart of Sidley started to use its funding in 2014 and is due to finish in 2025. The idea behind the Big Local is about bringing together all the local talent, ambitions, skills and energy from individuals, groups and organisations who want to make their area an even better place to live.

Heart of Sidley is a community-led partnership, led entirely by local residents, in partnership with local organisations, businesses and others. They’re supported by a Big Local representative and two locally trusted organisations – Rother Voluntary Action and Southern Housing.

As they prepare their charity, Heart of Sidley Community Association, for the exciting future ahead, they continue to work towards the community’s priorities. They have a very proactive and driven group of people on board, who are all part of the Sidley community themselves. They ensure voices are heard and action is taken in their commitment to improving the area and opportunities for local people. For more information visit https://heartofsidley.co.uk/

 

Esmée Fairbairn Foundation

Esmée Fairbairn Foundation aims to improve our natural world, secure a fairer future and strengthen the bonds in communities in the UK. We unlock change by contributing everything we can alongside people and organisations with brilliant ideas who share our goals.

The Foundation is one of the largest independent grant-makers in the UK. In 2023, we provided £58.4m in funding towards a wide range of work in support of our aims. This includes additional funding to organisations we fund in response to the rising cost of living. We also provide social and impact investment for organisations with the aim of creating social and environmental impact. www.esmeefairbairn.org.uk

 

Future Creators & Talent Accelerator join forces on new project to help young people into creative employment across Sussex

Future Creators, part of Brighton Dome & Brighton Festival, and Talent Accelerator, part of De La Warr Pavilion, will lead the delivery of Coastal Catalyst, a 2-year partnership project that will develop new pathways into the creative industries for young people aged 14-25 along the Sussex Coastal Corridor.

Coastal Catalyst will see local authorities, educational institutions and businesses collaborate to build new creative employment opportunities and support young people into work. Supported by £900k funding from Arts Council England, the project will use cross-sector professional networks to drive investment into young people’s creative skills, ensuring economic growth across the Sussex coast, from Bognor Regis in the west to Bexhill in the east.

The creative sector offers huge opportunities for young people and economic growth across the South East. The creative industries are worth £125 billion to the UK – more than the life sciences, automotive manufacturing, aerospace and the oil and gas sectors combined. In Brighton & Hove alone they generated more than £1.5bn in turnover last year and employed more than 16,000 people. Coastal Catalyst will help unlock this potential for the benefit of the region.

Photography: Laura Callahan

Coastal Catalyst is led by Future Creators and Talent Accelerator, with other consortium members including: University of Brighton, Department for Work & Pensions, East Sussex College, Arun District Council and The Royal Society of Arts.

The project will establish new Creativity Hubs in Arun, Eastbourne/Newhaven and Bexhill, plus a satellite hub in East Brighton, and create more opportunities for young people to work in the creative sector, such as new job roles, work experience placements and apprenticeships. Coastal Catalyst seeks to co-create a place-based response to systemic challenges by working with and within local communities.

Future Creators is Brighton Dome & Brighton Festival’s initiative to work collaboratively to develop the creative potential, skills and voice of children and young adults across Sussex. Their ambition is to prove to the world that collective action can nurture the creativity of children and has long term, positive and measurable effects. By understanding local, regional and national context, they work together to shape and co-develop work that responds to need and will make a difference.

Talent Accelerator is a De La Warr Pavilion programme that supports young people (aged 14 to 25) into creative careers in East Sussex and is the inspiration and cornerstone of the transformational Creativity, Community and Skills capital programme. Talent Accelerator aims to raise understanding of the range of jobs available in the creative industries, develop high quality work experiences, opportunities for skills development and expand what creative businesses and cultural organisations can offer young people. In the first two years (2022 – 2024) 6,468 young people have gone through elements of the Talent Accelerator.

Coastal Catalyst is a Place Partnership project, funded by the Arts Council National Lottery Project Grant scheme.

Peter Chivers, Director of Future Creators, part of Brighton Dome & Brighton Festival, said:

“We’re delighted to be partnering with Talent Accelerator to lead this new programme. The creative industries offer huge opportunities for young people. Coastal Catalyst will unlock this by bringing together businesses, education partners and the creative sector to develop new pathways into employment in the sector. Young people are our future, and developing their creative skills will have long-term, positive and measurable benefits for the region.”

Stewart Drew, Director & CEO of the De La Warr Pavilion said: 

“Our commitment to developing the skills that young people need to follow a career in the creative industries is at the heart of our Community, Creativity and Skills capital project and the future of our region. We are delighted that our highly successful Talent Accelerator programme will collaborate with Future Creators to reach more young people to fulfil their individual potential whilst contributing to the economy of Sussex as a whole.”

A Week of Work Experience at DLWP

Last week, we welcomed several work-experience students from local schools and colleges to DLWP. During their time here, they gained hands-on experience in different departments. They worked with our staff in exhibitions, live programming, tech, finances, marketing and box office to learn about the roles and develop new skills.

At the end of the week, one of our work experience students interviewed the others about their time at the Pavilion. They all agreed that they enjoyed their time at DLWP, finding the opportunity useful. Find out what they had to say below.


What have you enjoyed doing here?

Lily: All the work in the kitchen/shop area as I was able to engage with customers and people the most.

Kris: Everything.

Maple: Making the logo/poster and going to the flatland site.

Oriana: Learning new things such as light and sound tech.

 

Have you learned anything?

Lily: What happens behind the scenes of working at the De La Warr.

Kris: What goes on behind the scenes of an event.

Maple: How they set up and change the space for each exhibition.

 

Did you enjoy the week overall, why?

Lily: Yes as I have learned my new skills.

Kris: I enjoyed it as I did a variety of work.

Maple: Invigilator of an exhibition.

Oriana: Yes as I learnt so much new stuff.

 

Has this benefited you?

Lily: Yes, as I have learnt a lot of what goes on in the De La Warr.

Kris: Yeah, its taught me a lot about working here.

Maple: Yes, as I have seen what it’s like to have a job in an artistic place.

Oriana: Yeah.

 

Would you recommend this to someone?

Lily: Yes.

Kris: Yeah.

Maple: Yeah.

Oriana: If someone was interested.


It was a pleasure to have them and we thank them for all their hard work!

To learn more about our upcoming work experience and opportunities head to Talent Accelerator 

DLWP X FLATLAND Studio Development Programme

We are delighted to announce the 2024/25 cohort for the DLWP x Flatland Studio Development Programme. This year-long programme offers artists based within East Sussex an opportunity to focus on developing and sustaining their practice in readiness for progressing their career within the supportive network of Bexhill’s Beeching Road Studios. We are delighted that this programme moves forward into its second iteration which celebrates our shared ethos as two organisations focussed on emerging artists’ development in the region.

The artists are :

Richard Lockett ( @_richardlockett )

Sarah Gomes Harris ( @sarahgomesharris )

Flo Wright ( @flo_wrightsart )

Vannessa Farinha ( @vanessafarinha_art )

 Alastair Laas ( @laas_artist )

Congratulations to them all.

This opportunity would not be possible without the significant support towards artists from Rother District Council

 

Artist biographies:

Richard Lockett is an artist based in Brighton and London, and studied at the The Slade (2006), Goldsmiths (2014) and The Royal Academy Schools (2019). Richard works across drawing, photography, digital media, video, collage and sound often coming together as installation. Richard’s works attempt to record sensorial experiences in a sculptural and spatial manner. Areas of interest include the arrangement, potentiality and psychology of interior spaces; neurodivergence through recording and mark making; mapping as aesthetic tool for finding different neural connections between subject and objects.

Sarah Gomes Harris / SGH  is a Hastings based animator, artist and campaigner. Her work is often an overt political response to housing, climate or social injustice, playfully engaging the viewer and/or community. The works include interactive animatable sculptures, soft sculptures, puppets or ‘rides’, a board game, a comic or zine, a single sheet newspaper found on a bus. Some works are seen as performative art eg walking round the UK dressed as a house to raise awareness of the housing crisis. All blur lines between cartoon, politics and reality, regularly taken out onto the streets or non-typical artist environments.

Flo Wright is an artist based in East Sussex. She studied Fine art painting at Wimbledon school of art. Her practice examines dynamics in the domestic space. She draws on what objects people surround themselves with to create an image of their lives. Using references from pop culture, the historic, a queer perspective and science fiction. Primarily through paint, she uses storytelling techniques to imagine and rebuild spaces. Which the objects can re-inhabit; and become sentient. In her paintings she examines how these objects can reflect their owners and act as hauntings of the past. And be used in the present to play out alternative realities.

Vanessa Farinha explores the labels and signs we cling to so that we might understand who we are, individually, collectively and between the in-between. She’s never limited to a single medium and is often a little tongue-in-cheek. She has created performance, photography, collage, installation, painting and video work and has exhibited internationally. Vanessa Farinha grew up in North London, studied Fine Art at Goldsmith’s University, London, later becoming a creative producer and is now living in Hastings.

Alastair Laas grew up in the industrial heart of England called the Black Country, where he was exposed to the multifaceted aspects of capitalism. From humble beginnings, he worked in a tattoo parlour, built luxury yachts, cleaned offices, and sold insurance to art collectors, before moving into TV and advertising. His professional experience continues to provide a unique perspective on the intricacies of labor and human value that are fundamental to his vision and approach as an artist.

DE LA WARR PAVILION & HEART OF SIDLEY ANNOUNCE APPOINTMENTS OF ARCHITECTS FOR LEVELLING UP CAPITAL PROJECTS

Two architectural practices have been appointed for the Bexhill and Sidley Levelling Up Capital Projects. They are:

· HAWORTH TOMPKINS for the De La Warr Pavilion

· BAKER ARCHITECTURAL for the new Sidley Community Hub

 

Haworth Tompkins   is a Stirling Prize-winning architectural studio with an international reputation for intelligent, purposeful design.

Previous capital projects include:

· The National Theatre (2015) – Dennis Lasdun’s modernist masterpiece.

· Lightroom, London (2023) – an immersive exhibition venue in King’s Cross

· @sohoplace (2022) – the first new-build West End Theatre for 50 years.

· Theatre Royal Drury Lane (2021) – major restoration of the grade I listed theatre

· Battersea Arts Centre (2018) – the rebirth of a town hall for community and theatre use

· V&A Collection and Research Centre (2018) — open-access facility to house the V&A’s collection of two million artefacts.

· The Chichester Festival Theatre (2014) – the renewal and expansion of Powell and Moya’s landmark Modernist producing theatre.

Haworth Tompkins’ projects have won over 180 major design awards, including the RIBA Stirling Prize in 2014, and were named AJ100 Practice of the Year in both 2020 and 2022. The practice has over 30 years’ experience of collaborating with socially driven organisations who share their belief in creating spaces for people and communities.

The core Design Team for the project have also been appointed. They are:

· MEP & Sustainability: Buro Happold

· Civil & Structural Engineering: Price and Myers

· Transport : Caneparo

· Planning: Lichfields

· Fire Engineer The Fire Surgery

· Acoustics CharcoalBlue

· Landscape JCLA Landscape Architects

· Accessibility HADA

· Theatre CharcoalBlue

Stewart Drew, Director and CEO of the De La Warr Pavilion says:

“We couldn’t be more excited to have such a considered, thoughtful and innovative conservation-based architectural practice as Haworth Tompkins committed to securing and transforming our Grade One Listed building into a place for creativity, community and skills.

Haworth Tompkins, along with a team of leading experts in their field, will ensure that the Pavilion can continue to deliver culture-led regeneration for the region, positively impacting on some of the highest areas of deprivation in the southeast. In our improved spaces, we will continue to offer culture, entertainment, learning, and social interaction all in one place whilst remaining a viable, sustainable and relevant part of our community for many years to come.”

Lucy Picardo, Director, Haworth Tompkins says:

“We are thrilled to have been awarded the opportunity to work alongside Rother District Council and DLWP to develop proposals for the refurbishment of the iconic, modernist, Grade I Listed De La Warr Pavilion.
Alongside our experienced and creative team, and with valuable input from the local community, we are looking forward to creating a renewed Pavilion for the arts for staff, performers, exhibitors, and visitors alike.
Building upon our extensive experience in delivering cultural heritage projects including ‘NT Future’ for the National Theatre, Battersea Arts Centre and the remodelling of the modernist Chichester Festival Theatre, we are well placed to work with all the partners and stakeholders to deliver an ambitious vision for the Pavilion”.

 

Baker Architectural  is a multidisciplinary architectural practice of award-winning Chartered Architects and Chartered Technologists, proudly rooted in Rother and Hastings. This local connection provides the community with the distinct advantage of being guided by a company deeply invested in delivering excellent opportunities. Baker Architectural comprehensively grasp the challenges inherent in community projects and are committed to crafting buildings that cater to everyone’s needs, including the youth, elderly, and disabled. Moreover, they ensure forward-thinking designs that seamlessly integrate sustainable concepts into every aspect of the new community hub.

The core Design Team for the project has also been appointed. They are

· Mechanical, Electrical & Plumbing: IWA

· Project Manager/ Principal Designer: Potter Raper

· Civil Engineer: Borne Project Services

· Structural Engineer: Waller Gray

· Planning: GRF Planning

· Landscape: ACTA

The Heart of Sidley Community Partnership says:

“The tireless efforts of our community association stand as a beacon of pride, dedicated to providing a nurturing home and vibrant hub for our neighbourhood. With unwavering commitment, we are excited to provide essential facilities that enrich the social fabric and enhance the well-being for all in Sidley. From recreational spaces to educational resources, a new café and sporting facilities, this project will foster a sense of belonging and unity. The hub will provide every member of the community with the opportunity to thrive with access to a hub which also serves as a catalyst for economic development, fostering prosperity and vibrancy within our neighbourhood.”

 

The projects are being made possible thanks to £19 million awarded to Rother District Council from the Government’s Levelling Up Fund for community, creativity and skills in Bexhill.

Cllr Doug Oliver, Rother District Council leader, said: “These projects will make a huge difference to the district, and I am delighted that they are moving forward with the appointment of design teams. Whilst there is still some way to go for both projects, I look forward to seeing them progress and help transform our communities.

“We are confident that the investment by the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities and other funders will improve the lives of the most vulnerable and disadvantaged communities.”

 

For further information on the DLWP Capital Project please contact Sally Ann Lycett at the De La Warr Pavilion on sally.ann.lycett@dlwp.com or Dawn Hepburn at Haworth Tompkins on dawn.hepburn@haworthtompkins.com

For further information on the Sidley Community Hub, please contact Tanya Vice at Heart of Sidley on Tanya Vice heartofsidley@gmail.com

 

Notes:

1. In January 2023, Rother District Council announced that it had been awarded £19m from the UK Government’s Levelling Up Fund, £17m of which was allocated to go towards the redevelopment of the De La Warr Pavilion and £2m towards a Community Hub for Sidley. Both projects will create new jobs, upskill local residents and bolster career progression in the area’s creative and cultural sectors, particularly for young people.

This investment will enable the delivery of cultural-led regeneration to improve the lives of the most vulnerable and disadvantaged people in Rother.

The money will go towards the transformation of the De La Warr Pavilion on Bexhill seafront and the development of new community facilities in Sidley.

 

2. The De La Warr Pavilion Design Team

· Haworth Tompkins https://www.haworthtompkins.com
· Buro Happold https://www.burohappold.com/
· Price and Myers https://www.pricemyers.com/
· Caneparo https://caneparoassociates.com/
· Lichfields https://lichfields.uk/
· The Fire Surgery https://thefiresurgery.com/
· Charcoalblue https://www.charcoalblue.com
· JCL https://www.jcla.co.uk/
· HADA http://www.piginkpress.com/about.html

 

3. The Sidley Community Hub Design Team

· Baker Architectural www.bakerarchitectural.co.uk
· Potter Raper www.potterraper.co.uk
· MGAC www.mgac.com
· Borne Project Services www.borneprojectservices.co.uk
· Waller Gray www.wallergray.co.uk
· ACTA www.actaland.com
· IWA M&E Consulting Engineers www.iwa.uk.com

 

See previous press release for further details of the projects here.

Further details can be found here.

 

Image credits:

De La Warr Pavilion, Ariel shot: Clear Air Flying

DLWP Design Team and Sidley Hub Design Team: Burst Photographs

Record turnout for 2024 Jobs Fair

A record number of people visited the 2024 Bexhill Jobs & Apprenticeships Fair on Friday 15 March. Almost 700 visitors came through the doors of the De La Warr Pavilion to explore live job vacancies, apprenticeships, placements, courses, skills development opportunities and back to work support.

The 2024 fair, in association with Bexhill College and East Sussex Healthcare NHS Trust, saw visitors queueing ahead of opening, and continued to be busy and vibrant through to the afternoon Quiet Time, introduced this year for visitors with access requirements or who might feel more comfortable in a quieter environment.

Visitor feedback on the fair has been hugely positive: “What a wonderful and well-organised event and very inclusive.” and “Engaging stalls were the best – a great way to find out about roles.”

Exhibitor feedback has included: “We are a small local business and successfully recruited at last year’s Jobs Fair so as we are expanding, we are back this year to fill our new roles.”  and “This is our first time at the Jobs Fair. It’s been really busy since the doors opened and we have had lots of interest in the jobs we are looking to fill. It’s also been good to meet so many other local businesses and organisations. Everyone has been so friendly.”

Huw Merriman MP said: “It was fantastic to see so many visitors, businesses and organisations at this, the 8th, annual Bexhill Jobs & Apprenticeships Fair. The event continues to be a crucial milestone in the local recruitment calendar with many exhibitors returning year in year out because it’s so productive for them – I heard from one accountancy firm that they recruit all their apprentices at the fair every year. Visitors can come to the fair confident in the knowledge that every business and organisation exhibiting will have something tangible to offer. Matching genuine opportunities with people who are actively looking for work, develop their skills or learn is what continues to make the fair so successful.”

Stewart Drew, Director & CEO, De La Warr Pavilion said: “Another amazing Jobs Fair, busy and buzzy from the start, the Auditorium packed with exhibitors and visitors deep in conversation. Once again, there was a brilliant mix of exhibitors – large corporates and organisations rubbing shoulders with small businesses and community groups – and a fantastic range of visitors of all ages. It was great expanding the fair out across the building with workshops taking place in the Studio and Learning Zone as well as on the Auditorium Stage and the new Quiet Time worked really well, making the fair feel even more welcoming and inclusive. Huge thanks to the all the exhibitors and visitors for making the fair such a special community event and particular thanks to East Sussex Healthcare NHS Trust, Bexhill College, Gatwick Airport, Govia Thameslink Railway, Hastings Direct and the other 2024 fair sponsors for their invaluable support.”

Image Credit: Burst Photos

National Apprenticeship Week 2024: Alex’s Story ( Creative Industries Production Technician Apprentice)

It’s National Apprenticeship week and we are celebrating the value and opportunities they provide for young people breaking into the creative industries. We spoke to one of our apprentices, Alex, who is currently at the De La Warr completing his Creative Industries Production Technician apprenticeship. Having started in October 2023, Alex has been learning on the job, gaining new skills and confidence with support from his team. He finds his role exciting and would recommend it to others who may be interested. ‘No day is the same, daily tasks are varied depending on the gigs and the possibilities after completing the apprenticeship are vast. You can go into so many different environments from working on cruises to being a touring technician.’

Alex will be joined on his apprenticeship training here at DLWP with apprentices from The Dome Brighton and Eastbourne Theatres. All training is delivered by East Sussex College Group in the DLWP auditorium under the guidance of our Technical Manager Mat McQuade.

It’s not too late to join! If you are a venue looking to extend your technical team adding an apprentice is an excellent way to grow your own! Get in touch with Kim Byford Project Director Talent Accelerator for more information kim.byford@dlwp.com

Exhibitions Programme 2024

Spring

Manuel Mathieu: The end of figurationFebruary 17–May 27Manuel Mathieu (b. 1986, Haiti) is a multidisciplinary artist working with painting, drawing, ceramics, and installation. His work investigates themes of historical violence, erasure and cultural approaches to physicality, nature, and spiritual legacy. Mathieu’s interests are partially informed by his upbringing in Haiti and his experience emigrating to Montréal at the age of 19. Freely operating in between and borrowing from numerous historical influences and traditions, Mathieu aims to find meaning through a spiritual mode of apparition.

Mathieu’s exhibition at DLWP will be his first major institutional presentation in Europe and will bring together new and existing artworks.

Clara Jo: Nests of Basalt, Nests of WoodFebruary 17–March 31Clara Jo (b. 1986, United States) works with film, photography and installation to re-engage socio-political understandings of the world in ways that entangle the senses. She plays with speculative narratives to offer alternative readings of certain terrains, examining their material imprints and deep erasures. By reimagining these contexts through her work, Jo questions how these stories can feed into collective imaginations and fictions during moments of crisis.

At DLWP, Jo will present Nests of Basalt, Nests of Wood. This new film installation presents a speculative narrative of labour and ecological histories in Mauritius, filmed in Albion and Flat Island, with a fictional layer of computer-generated animation.

Laetitia YhapApril 6–May 27Laetitia Yhap (b. 1941, UK) is best known for intricate paintings of fishermen on The Stade Beach, Hastings, UK, created on unusually shaped panels individually hand-made by the artist for each work. Yhap moved to Hastings from London in 1967, and in 1974 began her cycle of work depicting raw glimpses into the lives of the fishing community, documenting daily scenes as they unfolded on the beach.

Enraptured by the ritual of their activities, Yhap began to draw the fishermen from life before returning to her studio to make the paintings. She would continue making works of this community for twenty-five years, bringing forth their resilience and spirit in the face of such dangerous labour conditions. Yhap’s oeuvre serves as a unique picture of an industry that today looks completely different, as rapid industrialisation and environmental shifts render the lives of those working at sea increasingly precarious.

This exhibition at DLWP celebrates Yhap as a unique voice within British art history and highlights the relevance of her work to pressing ecological concerns within our local and wider landscapes.SummerJune 22–September 1

Barbara KastenSpace as a stage of a changing reality is the central motif of Barbara Kasten’s (b. 1936, United States) photographs and film installations, which she produces in an ‘interdisciplinary performance’ between photography, sculpture, architecture, and painting. Since the 1970s, Kasten has been constructing expansive installations made of architectural ‘props’ such as glass, mirrors, or wood constructions in front of the camera for her abstract ‘photographs’. These theatrical arrangements are restaged with coloured light, an approach going back to Kasten’s roots as a painter and sculptor.

Through her cross-genre practice and continued use of analogue photographic materials, Kasten’s visionary practice has influenced a new generation of contemporary artists amidst the prevalence of digital imagery, Photoshop and 3D rendering today. Kasten’s exhibition at DLWP will be her first institutional solo presentation in the UK and will centre upon a new installation responding to the distinctive architectural features of our Grade I listed building.

Rebecca BellantoniRebecca Bellantoni (b. 1981, UK) is a London-based artist who draws from everyday occurrences and abstracts them. She works across moving image, installation, performance, photography, textiles, printmaking, sculpture, sound-text, and ceramics.

Through investigations into the layered lens of Black women’s writing (fiction and nonfiction), metaphysics, philosophy, religion and spirituality, geography and the aesthetics of them, Bellantoni gently prises apart the concept of the accepted/expected ‘real’ and the experiential ‘real’, looking at how these removed borders may offer meditative experiences and portals to self, collective reasoning and healing thought and action. Bellantoni’s presentation at DLWP will be her first institutional solo exhibition.AutumnSeptember 21–November 17

Mike SilvaMike Silva (b. 1970, Sweden) is a London-based artist whose work explores intimate connections to personal memory. By delving into an ongoing archive of photographs, Silva paints portraits, interiors and still lifes that often feature acquaintances, friends, and lovers of past and present.

Rooted in the London of the ‘90s or early ‘00s, many of the photographs that Silva paints from carry the allure of the past, but also the inherent poignancy in looking at an image of a moment that no longer exists. Whilst the paintings are a way of remembering, they are also cathartically about letting go. Silva’s interiors or domestic spaces expose quietly observed moments, such as when light hits a particular wall or floor of a shared bedroom, kitchen or living room. Using white generously in the painting process offers a milky or hazy quality to the works, perhaps a reflection on the ungraspable and transient nature of memory.

At DLWP, Silva will present a selection of new and existing works in our light-filled Ground floor gallery. This will be his first institutional solo exhibition.

Michelle RobertsMichelle Roberts (b. UK) is a Bexhill-based artist whose paintings and drawings are ambitious in scale, conception and realisation. Her subjects arise from the realm of lived experience, such as a holiday, a visit to the ‘Dinosaur World’ exhibition, or the thrill of an Air Show, whilst other works celebrate events such as the Diamond Jubilee, Remembrance Day, or films that she has seen. While photographs serve as references, they are mere hints and prompts rather than images to be copied. Roberts’ meticulous drawing style intricately dissects shapes and forms, creating patterns with unwavering precision and control, with compositions that come to life through vivid colour. Through detailed yet joyful execution, Roberts invites the viewer to explore each of these vibrant universes, drawing our attention to the different ways that we remember.

Roberts’ solo exhibition is programmed in collaboration with Outside In, following the artist winning first prize at Outside In’s national open exhibition, Humanity, in 2023. Roberts is a member of Project Art Works, a collective of neurodiverse artists and activists based in Hastings, and was previously included in the group exhibition, In the Realm of Others at DLWP (2015).

WinterOpening November 30

Callum HillCallum Hill (b. 1987, Canada) is a British/American artist filmmaker whose work moves between psychological enquiry, gender, politics, and poetry. Unpredictable and erratic in narrative, her films slip between documentary and fiction, inhabiting an existential and psychedelic mentality towards the human condition.

For her solo exhibition, Hill is developing a major new film work, commissioned by DLWP.