We are delighted to be partners with PEER London and Grundy Blackpool, in commissioning a new touring exhibition.
The artists have radically re-imagined the traditional seaside show Punch and Judy, transforming the puppet booth living quarters of the pair into an oversized, warped and darkly humorous place with the subtle yet ever-present threat of violence. Currently showing at PEER, the show will evolve in scale, form and content in three acts at the three galleries over a year.
Act 1: PEER, London, 9 November 2016 – 28 January 2017
Act 2: Grundy Art Gallery, Blackpool, 17 June – 12 August 2017
Act 3: De La Warr Pavilion, Bexhill-On-Sea, 21 October – December 2017
Love Life: Act 1 opens at PEER, where the gallery environment becomes an alternative domestic space strewn with crudely made props, chattels, bling, tools, trappings, and fixtures and fittings. Unfinished narratives slip between the absurd, obscene, tragic and comedic.
Baldock’s giant infant complete with Cyclops head sits in a large pink baby walker greeting visitors as they enter the gallery, accompanied by the melodramatic strains of Jon and Emma (2016), Baldock and Hart’s collaborative soundtrack. The song is adapted from John and Marsha, the comedian and puppeteer Stan Freberg’s 1951 cult record parodying soap opera dialogue. Nearby Hart’s ceramic fists rub crying eyes, and a gang of “nagging” feet line up against the walls.
In the adjoining space, Baldock’s large hessian and net curtain hangs across the gallery’s wide window appliquéd with a multitude of eyes gazing out on the street. On the floor sits a toy basket filled with the decapitated heads and masks of Punch and Judy characters. Hart’s strings of real sausages spell the words ‘YOUR BACK’ and accompany ceramic objects including a huge locket, wall-mounted speech bubbles that look like Punch’s profile, and a cast fragment reminiscent of an angry hand or loud graphic bang. This strange mise-en-scene is completed by Baldock’s oven stacked with anthropomorphic pots and pans and a washing machine spewing out its contents.
In 2016 Emma Hart won the Max Mara Art Prize for Women and in 2015 was supported by the Paul Hamlyn Foundation Awards for Artists. She has exhibited extensively across the UK and Europe including at Camden Arts Centre, Folkestone Triennial, Whitechapel Gallery and La Galerie CAC Noisy Le Sec, France. Jonathan Baldock has exhibited internationally including at Nicelle Beauchene, New York; The Rockbund Art Museum, Shanghai; Chapter Arts Centre, Cardiff; and The Mackintosh Museum, Edinburgh. Baldock and Hart met on a residency at Wysing Arts Centre and have collaborated on projects ever since, including SUCKERZ in 2015 at L’etrangere, London.
Emma Hart lives and works in London. In 2016 she won the Max Mara Art Prize for Women in collaboration with the Whitechapel Gallery. In 2015 she was awarded a Paul Hamlyn Foundation award for Visual Art. Recent solo exhibitions include: big MOUTH, Grand Union, Birmingham (2015); Sticky, Austrian Cultural Forum, London (2015); Spread, Art Exchange (2015); Giving It All That, Folkestone Triennial (2014); Dirty Looks, Camden Arts Centre (2013); M20 Death Drives, Whitstable Biennale, Whitstable (2012); TO DO, Matt’s Gallery, London; Word Processor, Stanley Picker Gallery, London (2012). Recent group exhibitions include: The London Open, Whitechapel Gallery (2015); SUCKERZ, L’etrangere, London (2015) a joint show with Jonathan Baldock; Only the Lonely, La Galerie CAC Noisy Le Sec, France (2015); Dear Luxembourg, Nosbaum Reding, Luxembourg (2015); Hey I’m Mr.Poetic, Wysing Arts Centre (2014); Bloody English, OHWOW Gallery, Los Angeles (2013); The World Turned Upside Down, Mead Gallery, Coventry (2013). Hart was shortlisted for The Jarman Awards 2013, and awarded a Random Acts commission. In 2012 she was shortlisted for the Jerwood / Film and Video Umbrella Awards: Tomorrow Never Knows, with an exhibition at Jerwood Space, London. Hart was resident at Camden Arts Centre with her Question Department in 2009 and for The Forest residency at Wysing Arts Centre in 2012. Hart received an MA in Fine Art from the Slade in 2004 and completed her PhD in Fine Art at Kingston University in 2013. In 2017 she will present solo exhibitions at the Whitechapel Gallery, London and the Collezione Maramotti, Italy. www.emmahart.info
Jonathan Baldock (b.1980) is London based artist. Recent solo shows include The Skin I Live in, Nicelle Beauchene, New York (2016); The Soft Machine, Chapter Arts Centre, Cardiff; Notes from the Orifice, Vitrine Gallery, London; Hot Spots, The Apartment, Vancouver; Warm Bodies, (a 2-person show with Olga Balema), Kunstvereniging Diepenheim, (2014); A Strange cross between a Butcher`s Shop and a Nightsclub, Wysing Arts Centre, Cambridge (2013) and The Blue Epoch, Colloredo – Mansfeldský Palác, AMoYA, Prague, Czech (2012). Recent group exhibitions include Baldock Pope Zahle, Northern Gallery for Contemporary Art, Sunderland; Seepferdchen und Flugfische (touring), Arp Museum Bahnhof Rolandseck, Remagen, (2016); Archetypes, Power, and Puppets, College of Wooster Art Museum (CWAM), Wooster, Ohio (USA); Only the Lonely / Seuls les solitaires (curated by Elina Suoyrjö), La Galerie centre d’art contemporain, Paris (Fr); and The Varieties – Dance First, Think Later, Harris Museum and Art Gallery, Preston (UK), (2015). Forthcoming solo shows include SPACE, London (April 2017) and CGP London (June 2017). www.jonathan-baldock.com
PEER is an arts charity that has commissioned and presented more than a hundred exhibitions, publications, events and public realm projects over nearly 20 years. Based in Shoreditch since 1999 and on Hoxton’s High Street since 2002, its core ethos is to engage the widest possible audiences by offering high quality art as part of daily life. PEER has done this through its ambitious programme of projects with many celebrated artists such as Fiona Banner, Martin Creed, Siobhan Hapaska, Anthony McCall, Bob & Roberta Smith, and Danh Vo, amongst others. PEER offers both emerging and established artists the opportunity to test bold ideas in an intimate environment that stimulates experimentation and dialogue. PEER completed a major capital project in April 2016, reopening with a new façade, renovated galleries and a re-landscaped surrounding public realm with public artworks by Chris Ofili and London Fieldworks. www.peeruk.org
Grundy Art Gallery is Blackpool’s gallery for contemporary art and offers a year round programme of exhibitions and events including solo and group exhibitions together with talks, workshops and educational activities. The gallery is housed in a Grade II listed Carnegie building and has a collection that was founded in 1908, following a bequest by brothers John and Cuthbert Grundy. Recent exhibitions include solo shows for Mark Leckey, Heather Phillipson and Jennet Thomas and today the collection includes works by Heather Phillipson, Yinka Shonibare MBE, Ruth Claxton, Martin Creed, Laura Ford, Gilbert and George, Augustus John, Eric Ravilious and Haroon Mirza. In 2015 the gallery embarked on a series of exhibitions of light art, to coincide with the annual Blackpool Illuminations, undertaking the major group exhibitions Sensory Systems (2015) and Neon: The Charged Line (2016). Grundy Art Gallery is funded and administered by Blackpool Council and also receives regular funding as one of Arts Council England’s National Portfolio Organisations. www.grundyartgallery.com
Supported by Arts Council England through the National Lottery.
There are plenty of welcoming and good value B&Bs & boutique hotels in Bexhill. The De La Warr Pavilion regularly uses the following :
- By Rail
Direct trains go from London Victoria, Brighton and Ashford to Bexhill.
There are also trains from London Charing Cross, changing at St. Leonards Warrior Square and from London Bridge or Charing Cross going to Battle. Battle is only a short taxi journey away (15 mins approx).
Visit www.nationalrail.co.uk for up-to-date train travel information. - Taxis
Town Taxis: 01424 211 511
Parkhurst Taxis: 01424 733 456 - By Car
If driving from the London area:
Take the M25, then A21 to Hastings. Turn off at John‘s Cross and follow the signs to Bexhill.
OR
Take the A22 to Eastbourne, go across the Bishop roundabout to the A271 and follow the signs to Bexhill and the seafront. The De La Warr Pavilion is on the Marina.
From the Brighton area:
Follow the A27 out of Brighton until you arrive in Bexhill On Sea. - Parking
Please be aware the Rother District car park outside the De La Warr Pavilion operates paid parking until 7pm. After this time parking is free. There is also lmiited free car parking along the seafront.
Within the limits of this Grade One listed building, the De La Warr Pavilion strives to be fully accessible with a range of facilities to support your visit.
Assistance Dogs are permitted into the building.
Please contact the Box Office on 01424 229 111 to arrange a visit.
Facilities for disabled visitors
- Ramped access at the front of the building
- A low counter at the Box Office and Information Desk
- Disabled toilets on two floors
- A lift to all floors
- Accessible galleries on both floors
- An accessible Café
- Spaces for wheelchairs in the auditorium for seated events
- Ramped access in the auditorium for events during the day
- Ramped access into the Studio
- Two travel wheelchairs are available for use at the De La Warr Pavilion. To reserve, please call our box office and information desk on (01424) 229111 or ask a member of staff on arrival. The chairs are provided on a first come, first served basis and are intended for use inside the Pavilion. Please contact us for more information.
Facilities for blind or visually-impaired
- Large print season brochures
Facilities for the hard-of-hearing
- An T-Switch induction loop in some areas of the auditorium (please indicate when booking as this facility is not available on the balcony)
- British Sign Language interpretation tours of the building and exhibitions are available on request.