Brewers Towner International

The Brewers Towner Award of £10,000, sponsored by Brewers Decorator Centres, was awarded to Harald Smykla for Iconoclash Press Flowers. Find out more on the Towner Blog.

Brewers Towner International, a biennial exhibition of contemporary visual arts, returns to Towner Eastbourne, featuring a range of artists, local, national and international, coming together to share work that addresses the theme of SANCTUARY. The exhibition has been curated by Noelle Collins, Exhibitions & Offsite Curator, Towner Eastbourne.

Following an open call, 23 artists were selected by an esteemed panel including Elizabeth Price (Turner Prize-winning artist), Sepake Angiama (Artistic Director, Iniva), and Noelle Collins (Exhibitions & Offsite Curator, Towner Eastbourne). 19 artists will be part of the exhibition and a further four, meanwhile, will present a concurrent public programme.

The artists include a number based on the South Coast - Nigel Caple, Sharon Haward, Kevin Hendley and Benjamin Phillips & Amy Fenton who live and work in East Sussex, as well as Graham Ellard & Stephen Johnstone, Hicham Gardaf, and Edward Liddle who are based in Kent. Artists based elsewhere in the UK include Maud Haya-Baviera who lives in Sheffield, and Ufuoma Essi, Melanie Jackson, Amanda Kyritsopoulou, Dene Leigh, Karen Russo, Lara Smithson and Harald Smykla all based in London. Christophe Lennox lives and works in Norway, and Steph Goodger lives and works in France. Work presented will include moving image, photography, drawing, painting, installation and live performance.

The open call for Brewers Towner International is an opportunity to recognise and appreciate how artistic communities are reflecting and responding to the economic, political, cultural, and environmental changes that are unfolding in the contemporary moment. Artists have studied the places that have become a sanctuary throughout the pandemic - finding solace in the studio, the home and the landscape. The resulting exhibition brings together a community of artists, makers and storytellers, examining subjects as varied as pattern, memory, identity and the migratory experience.

In SANCTUARY, paintings and drawings exploring ideas of memory, trauma, healing and collaboration will be exhibited alongside newspaper clippings embellished with floral patterns - transforming images of fear and violence into imaginary ecosystems. Considerations of the natural environment and its resilience are captured in large-scale paintings of a WWII-era pillbox engulfed by tree roots on the banks of the Medway river. Observations of routine and handcrafting, and ideas of the body as archive - a repository of history and site of resistance, will be presented in film and video works. Sculptural installations responding to architectural histories and ideas of exposure, vulnerability, light and shadow, will be shown alongside photographs of cinnamon stick structures reflecting childhood memories of Morocco and feelings of homesickness. Locations along the Sussex coast will feature in a series of works on paper, based on local landing points for those seeking asylum.

Brewers Towner International also incorporated further artists into Towner's public programme.

Performance
Ramona Ponzini frogs.picus.VANNA
Lucy (Project Art Works)

Film Screenings
Patrick Hough The Two Faces of Tomorrow (2021)
Felix Melia Money for Nothing (2021)

Running concurrently with Brewers Towner International in Towner’s ground floor Studio 2 is Duette, an exhibition of new and recent works by Ayo Akingbade, the recipient of the inaugural Brewers Towner Award in 2020.

Read more about our inaugural Towner International exhibition.

Some artworks explore adult themes, please speak to a member of staff if you have any concerns.