The banner on the wall of the Pavilion depicts a work Ice Pick Nick Fisherman from 1979 by artist Karl Wirsum (b.1939, USA), who collected toys and puppets. This work is inspired by his collection. They are small hand-made wooden puppets, with wooden handles for the puppeteer to hold. They depict fisherman, who used ice-picks to fish. The puppets are part of our How Chicago! Imagists 1960s & 70s exhibition, which features works by 14 artists whose distinctive and lively visual style would go on to influence some of the most important artists of the 20th century. Many of the works were inspired by the artists’ love of everyday items such as comic books, amusement arcades and advertising, with no hidden meaning.
We appreciate that the post on Facebook did not give background to this work, and we are sorry for any offence caused. We have spoken to some trusted community partners and have made the decision to keep the banner up. People who walk past the Pavilion will know that we regularly change our banners according to the season.
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The De La Warr Pavilion extend our biggest congratulations to Tai Shani for making the 2019 Turner Prize shortlist.
Shani’s artistic contribution to our spring exhibition, Still I Rise: Feminisms, Gender, Resistance, Act 2 and her continued support of our extended programme of events have been invaluable in the exhibition’s success. The Pavilion is thrilled to once again have the privilege of bringing Turner Prize-nominated work to our visitors.
From Turner Contemporary’s shortlist announcement:
For her participation in Glasgow International 2018, solo exhibition DC: Semiramis at The Tetley, Leeds and participation in Still I Rise: Feminisms, Gender, Resistance at Nottingham Contemporary and the De Le Warr Pavilion, Bexhill-on-Sea. The jury noted the compelling nature of Shani’s ongoing project Dark Continent, particularly the work’s ability to combine historical texts with contemporary references and issues.
Developed over four years, it takes inspiration from a 15th-century feminist text, Christine de Pizan’s The Book of the City of Ladies. Shani uses theatrical installations, performances and films to create her own allegorical city of women populated by fantastical characters, transporting the viewer to another time and place.
Co-curator of Still I Rise, Cédric Fauq, on why Shani’s work was included in the exhibition: “Tai Shani’s work has that potency to shift the aesthetic vocabulary often attached to contemporary feminist practices. Not only her work appeals to the eyes, but it also has that haptic quality, it makes you want to touch. What I find particularly compelling is how this better leads you to focus on the stories she is telling. More than a realm, Tai’s body of work creates a whole cosmos. One where white patriarchy got swallowed by a black hole.”
Showings, 2018
“These are models for a structured, tragic play about my family.
These are sites for myth making and the collapse of myth into prosaic materials both natural and synthetic.
These are her bodily remains.
These are cryptic; they are spell books, to be read literally but with profound belief.
These are maquettes for never closing, hedonistic nightclubs, where we can lose our minds.
These are a symbolic portrait of a time-travelling mystic. These are an aerial drone view of archaeological sites of unknown civilisations, from the very far past of the very far future.
These are dwellings for my cat Oedipuss.
These are a faery corpse.
These are a medieval vision of the soul as resembling a castle, formed of a single diamond or a very transparent crystal, and containing many rooms, just as in Heaven there are many mansions.
These are airports for extra-terrestrials my parent’s sibling said when they saw them.
These are portraits for ghosts to come into our world, they can be summoned here.”
Still I Rise: Feminisms, Gender, Resistance, Act 2, 2019, De La Warr Pavilion, Installation View. Image courtesy of Rob Harris.Still I Rise: Feminisms, Gender, Resistance, Act 2, 2019, De La Warr Pavilion, Installation View. Image courtesy of Rob Harris.
Dark Continent (Phantasmagoregasm), 2018
“Phantasmagoregasm is an 18th-century hermaphrodite writer of Gothic fiction. Many of the early Victorian prominent gothic writers were women that wrote under their own names, or under psychonyms, arguably establishing the horror genre. That character that appears in this exhibition is one of twelve from my Dark Continent project. They are interpretations of women that, at different points in history, had access to a public life and selfrealisation under supernatural and mystical terms.”
Still I Rise: Feminisms, Gender, Resistance, Act 2, 2019, De La Warr Pavilion, Installation View. Image courtesy of Rob Harris.
Ann Kramer delivers a crash-course history lesson on women’s suffrage in Bexhill and Hastings
Our aim for the workshops was to both provide information about the local women’s suffrage campaign and some key women within that campaign, and to make space and time for people to express their personal views verbally and creatively, using written and visual outlets.
With this in mind, Ashley McCormick and myself met on a couple of occasions to identify appropriate crossover elements within the Still I Rise exhibition that could be used to introduce elements from the local women’s suffrage campaign, based on my book Turbulent Spinsters: Women’s Fight for the Vote in Hastings and St Leonards. Reasons for doing this reflect the fact that local suffrage activity is not well known and also that, it can be argued, women’s fight for the vote was an extremely important example of women’s resistance that issues around feminism and gender highlighted in the exhibition.
Once we had identified the appropriate exhibits, we were able to plan and organise the workshop, ensuring a balance between providing information and encouraging participation in the form of various activities.
We began at the entrance to the exhibition with a general welcome and introduction, and a brief overview of the local women’s suffrage campaign, introducing local campaigner Barbara Bodichon and defining ‘suffragist’ and ‘suffragette’ along the way. Attendees were then invited to define what feminism(s) meant to them and to record personal acts of resistance. Some were shared and generated a lot of discussion.
We then moved to the first exhibit, a board game Roots and Bootstraps, which we examined. I used the exhibit as a jumping off point to explore issues of class within the suffrage campaign. I described the class composition of the local campaign, introducing activists such as Emma Fricker Hall, Jane Strickland and Lady Muriel Brassey. Participants were invited to make a list or diagram of female friendships and alliances and their meaning to them.
The exhibit Water Cooler Moments provided the opportunity for me to discuss verbal and physical attacks on suffragettes, locally and nationally, including hurling missiles, anti-suffrage letters to the press, physical attacks by the police and force-feeding. This was followed with an activity based on producing a mind-map of barriers that women still face today.
Our third stop was at Mary Lowndes’ suffragette banners and See Red posters, which I used to talk about the creativity and pageantry of women’s politics via banners, posters and slogans. I also gave examples of local suffragists and suffragettes, such as Isabella Darent Harrison who joined major demonstrations in London and also carried out creative acts of resistance in Hastings and St Leonards.
Finally we moved to the roof top foyer where we invited people to create campaigning slogans and placards, using coloured paper, stencils and collaging material. A number of brilliant slogans were produced and there was energetic discussion around a number of issues.
I enjoyed co-facilitating the workshop enormously. It was a lively and enthusiastic event. Participants were clearly engaged and found the subject matter stimulating, generating some very interesting debates. These in turn raised important issues such as the difficulty in defining feminism, the interlocking natures of oppressions, how personal acts of resistance, such as deciding not to wear make-up, might seem quite small, but can have a much wider impact. All the participants who attended certainly seem to have appreciated the workshop and to have gained insight and inspiration from the experience, not least the opportunity to discuss gender issues with others. I was delighted to have the opportunity to co-facilitate the workshop and found it a very positive experience.
Today little girls were made of far more adventurous ingredients than sugar and spice and all things nice!
In Tales for Toddlers today, Polly was sick of putting the kettle on; Little Miss Muffet wasn’t scared of the spider any more; Mary wasn’t quite so contrary and decided to explore the world beyond the garden; the queen had better things to do than sit in the parlour eating bread and honey, and the maid was tired of hanging out the clothes.
Responding to DLWP’s current exhibition Still I Rise: Feminisms, Gender, Resistance, Act 2, storyteller Kevin Graal introduced five traditional British nursery rhymes which frame girls and women in vulnerable or disempowered roles. Then Tales for Toddlers participants created collages in which those very same nursery rhyme characters were placed in positions of power and authority. Polly took her kettle off and used its contents to put a fire out. Little Miss Muffet became fearless and walked on the moon. Contrary Mary left the garden and took up residence with her nursery rhyme sisters in the Oval Room of the White House, the Queen occupied the counting house and the maid told the king to go and wash his own clothes. Sugar and spice was replaced on the menu by courage and ingenuity.
Kevin says, “I wanted to reinforce the vital role that traditional nursery rhymes can play in the development of children’s language skills but at the same time have some fun with the patriarchal norms which often underpin these rhymes. So I invited our Tales for Toddlers friends to reframe them for the modern world and imagine different, more positive futures for their female characters. It was great fun for toddlers and adults alike!”
Here’s a ‘before and after’ picture created by one of our very talented parents, who brings her daughter to Tales for Toddlers. The children’s ideas were just as clever and adventurous!
Storyteller Ed Boxall tells us how he introduces little ones to art and exhibitions at the DLWP.
I like to base sessions for the pre-schoolers at Tales For Toddlers on coinciding exhibitions at the De La Warr. So, inspired by the Hayv Kahraman exhibition, Tales for Toddlers for February was all about pattern. Pattern appears in all sorts of ways in her work- the fabric of the clothes, the rhythms of the bodies.
The link to the exhibition needs of course to be right for the age group. With toddlers, we’re not ‘educating about art’ but experiencing the fundamental processes involved. In the long run, we might be helping children to get in the habit of delightful artistic processes and perhaps seeing a connection between what they do and things they see in galleries.
We had the space ready for the children by covering the floor with giant paper. You need something for children to do if they arrive early so they started by drawing round bits of their bodies with bright oil crayons on the paper while everyone arrived. They could repeat patterns with hands, fingers, feet and whole body shapes.
When everyone was ready, we moved onto pattern in poetry and enjoyed Brian Moses’ ‘Walking My Iguana’, which has a great chorus to repeat. Next, musical instruments were handed out and we noisily got to know our chosen instrument. We all joined in with my song ‘Yellow Cars’ which has a nice loud/quiet pattern from verse to verse.
We went back to the big paper for the remainder of the session but with some more pattern based processes to use. I brought rubbers to print with, stamp pads, patterned gift wrap and textured wallpaper. The stamp pads are great when you want to print but don’t quite want the full on mess of printing ink.
The children were probably unaware that we were ‘exploring pattern’ but I hope had a great time doing so and parents and children left with some easy things to try at home.
More Tales For Toddlers workshops with different storytellers and workshop leaders will take place on March 11, April 8 and May 13. See our full workshop list and sign up here.
The De La Warr Pavilion’s 2019 exhibition programme begins on February 9 with Still I Rise: Feminisms, Gender, Resistance, Act 2. Over 50 artists, designers, architects and archives are brought together in conversation across time and space to consider resistance from a gender perspective, spanning the 19th century to the present and beyond. Co-curated with Nottingham Contemporary where Act 1 opened last year, the exhibition is recalibrated for Act 2 to focus on architecture, design and the politics of space.
Act 2 includes: Fanny Adams, Jane Addams/Hull-House, Amina Ahmed, Alice Constance Austin, Xenobia Bailey, Glenn Belverio (Glennda Orgasm), Micha Cárdenas, CARYATIDS (Chicks in Architecture Refuse to Yield to Atavistic Thinking in Design and Society), Carolina Caycedo, Judy Chicago, Phyllis Christopher, Jackie Collins and Pat Garrett, Jamie Crewe, Blondell Cummings, Dyke Action Machine!, Feminist Land Art Retreat, Guo Fengyi, Carl Gent, Eduardo Gil, Kaveh Golestan, Gran Fury, Rachael House, Charlotte Johannesson, Jesse Jones, Corita Kent, Donna Kukama, Suzanne Lacy, Ellen Lesperance, Zoe Leonard, Sheila Levrant de Bretteville, Mary Lowndes, Matrix Feminist Design Co-operative, Louise Michel, Ad Minoliti, Okwui Okpokwasili, 0rphan Drift, Lucy Orta, Brenda Prince, Tabita Rezaire, Lala Rukh, Zorka Ságlová, See Red Women’s Workshop, Tai Shani, Terence Smith (Joan Jett Blakk), Linda Stupart, Ramaya Tegegne, Gille de Vlieg, VNS Matrix, Jala Wahid, Faith Wilding, Zadie Xa, Osías Yanov.
Opening the same day, Hayv Kahraman’s solo exhibition Displaced Choreographies brings together painting, drawing, sculpture and performance in an exploration of migrant consciousness. A recurrent female figure evokes shared histories between women, particularly women of colour, combining the artist’s personal history with “stolen” references including European Renaissance imagery, Iranian and Japanese miniature traditions.
The De La Warr Pavilion is the lead partner in OUTLANDS, the new national touring experimental music network; it will present a new commission, Ecstatic Material, by Keith Harrison and Beatrice Dillon on February 15.
Visit OUTLANDS Network for information.
Summer
The Chicago Imagists influenced some of the most important artists of the 20th century. Their first UK show in almost 40 years, How Chicago! Imagists 1960s & ’70s opens on June 15 and features paintings, objects, drawings, prints and ephemera, highlighting the artists’ individual styles, shared references and moments of connection. The show features 14 artists: Roger Brown, Sarah Canright, James Falconer, Ed Flood, Art Green, Philip Hanson, Gladys Nilsson, Jim Nutt, Ed Paschke, Christina Ramberg, Suellen Rocca, Barbara Rossi, Karl Wirsum and Ray Yoshida. Organised by Hayward Gallery Touring in collaboration with the De La Warr Pavilion and Goldsmiths Centre for Contemporary Art.
Our summer programme celebrates and interrogates the legacies of the Bauhaus in our First Floor Gallery. Events, workshops, performances and conversations will explore Bauhaus methodologies of “thinking through making,” and how these might continue to be useful. The programme is underpinned by a new commission by Lauren Godfrey, whose sculptures often take the form of domestic scaled objects, quasi-furniture and the almost-useful. In partnership with UCL.
Autumn
The autumn season begins on September 28 with a major new commission by Mikhail Karikis. It emerges from a year-long residency at Project Art Works, working with people who have complex support needs. Continuing his ongoing enquiry into social and political agency and the power of nonverbal communication, Karikis’ commission will respond to Project Art Works’ charter of rights for those with complex needs. Part of Project Art Works’ Explorers 2019 co-commission programme.
Occupying the First Floor Gallery will be an exhibition of new ceramic and tapestry works by Renee So, created during a residency at West Dean College of Arts and Conservation organised as an open call celebrating the 100th anniversary of the Bauhaus. So’s work often contains fictional personas, borrowed from ancient ritual masks, military and aristocratic portraiture. During her residency she will be paying particular attention to women of the Bauhaus.
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