After the resounding success of hosting the 2023 Turner Prize, Towner Art Gallery in Eastbourne is gearing up to unveil its latest Spring exhibitions, featuring the works of three talented British artists starting this May.
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| Towner Art Gallery in Eastbourne launches "Melting Ice / Rising Tide" featuring Emma Stibbon's extensive exploration of polar ice melt. The exhibition, running from May 9 to September 15, 2024,aims to bridge the perceived gap between remote polar extremes and our immediate local environment. Photo by Lucia Carpio |
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| Towner Eastbourne |
Making her debut with a large-scale showcase at a prestigious UK institution is Emma Stibbon. Her exhibition, titled "Melting Ice / Rising Tides," delves into the profound beauty and vulnerability of our planet, specifically focusing on the warming polar regions and its repercussions on the UK coastline. Stibbon's extensive exploration of polar ice melt, culminating in her exhibition running from May 9 to September 15, 2024, aims to bridge the perceived gap between remote polar extremes and our immediate local environment.
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| Emma Stibbon's Dark Horizon, 2023 |
At the heart of the exhibition lies "Cliff Fall, 2024" a monumental wall drawing and installation portraying the increasing occurrence of rock falls that are an increasingly common occurrence on the UK coastline. The breathtaking installation—an 8-meter-wide lifelike drawing of a Sussex cliff face - is accompanied by a reconstruction depicting the gradual erosion and cascading chalk rocks into the gallery space, it confronts viewers with the visceral impact of coastal degradation.
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| Emma Stibbon's Cliff Fall, 2024, installation at Towner Art Gallery, Eastbourne. Photo by Lucia Carpio |
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| Emma Stibbon standing amidst her Cliff Fall, 2004 installation at Towner Art Gallery. Photo by Lucia Carpio |
Accompanying this centerpiece are Stibbon’s evocative large-scale drawings and prints, depicting vast ice fields and towering bergs, inspired by her recent expeditions to Svalbard and the Weddell Sea, Antarctica. Facing the Cliff Fall installation is Breaker, Stibbon's 2023 work using ink, sea salt and Eastbourne sea water on paper.
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| Emma Stibbon with her painting Breaker, 2023, in ink, sea salt and Eastbourne sea water on paper. Photo by Lucia Carpio |
For a number of years Stibbon has been observing and recording the precariousness of the polar ice sheets and glaciers and the profound effect that ice melt is having on global sea level rise. Melting Ice/Rising Tides, running from May 9 to September 15 2024, will be a culmination of this work, making important connections between the apparent remote extremes of our planet and our local environment.
The show will create an immersive experience for the viewer, aiming to act as a stark reminder that the seemingly remote events of polar ice sheet melt is directly connected with the changes that we are witnessing in our local, more familiar UK landscape. The theme of "Melting Ice / Rising Tides," strikes a poignant chord given Eastbourne's coastal setting, nestled amidst the Beachy Head and South Downs National Park, where parts of its coastline is experiencing gradual erosion into the English Channel.
The work of another artist, Maria Amidu, featured from May 4 to September 8 2024, under "Future Collect Commission in the perpetual back and forth," explores the intricate interplay between paper and text. Her installation, "26,778,780 minutes," comprising laser-etched handmade abaca fibre paper, prompts contemplation on the concept of 'desire lines.' Audience participation becomes integral to the artwork's experience, as viewers are invited to interact with the prints, reflecting on fragility and collective care within a public gallery setting. Future Collect is a three-year programme designed to create a dynamic new model to transform the culture of commissioning and collecting within museums.
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| Maria Amidu |
Finally, Florence Peake presents "Factual Actual: Ensemble," a groundbreaking interdisciplinary installation showcased from May 9 to June 16, 2024, accompanied by performances on June 1st and 2nd. Known for her innovative fusion of choreography and visual art, Peake challenges traditional notions of painting and gallery space. Through a series of performances, Peake animates her towering canvases, creating a dynamic dialogue between movement, sound, and materiality. The monumental floor-to-ceiling painting, "Ensemble," serves as a testament to Peake's collaborative ethos, crafted in partnership with various community groups, embodying a rich tapestry of collective expression.
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| Florence Peake |
Re-interpreting and expanding on a performance at the National Gallery in London in 2021, FACTUAL ACTUAL presents seven towering paintings on unstretched canvases that levitate above a reflective dance floor. The canvases will be draped like carcasses, waiting to be animated. Five dancers using a rig and pulley system will hoist, lower, collapse, fold and drag the paintings throughout the performances. Shifting between flat and sculptural forms, the paintings create a cacophony of sound, a sea-like sonic soundscape live in the gallery. A 45m long, floor-to-ceiling frieze-style painting, Ensemble, envelops the gallery’s walls and the viewer at Towner Eastbourne. Respected for her unusual approach and non hierarchical process, Peake often works with a multitude of collaborators. This new painting was created through a series of workshops held at Southwark Park Galleries, London, in November 2022. Working with some of Southwark Park Galleries’ regular community groups – over 55s, young people and families – participants were invited to mark the canvas with Peake through their collective movements, which Peake then further developed in her studio over a period of three months.
Images courtesy of Towner Eastbourne.
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