Beecroft Art Gallery in Southend has a permanent collection of over 2000 works, ranging from 17th-century Dutch paintings to contemporary works. The collection includes examples by artists such as Molenaer, Ruisdael and Berchem plus 19th-century artists including Rossetti, Constable and Edward Lear. There are works by Carel Weight, the Great Bardfield Group, and a fine bronze by Jacob Epstein. The local artist Alan Sorrell is represented by his Drawings of Nubia series depicting a visit to Egypt prior to the building of the Aswan Dam. The Thorpe Smith Collection of local landscape views contains paintings, drawings and prints from as early as 1803.
Current exhibitions include:
Old Leigh Studios - Time & Tide which celebrates the work of 5 artists working together in Leigh-on-Sea. The exhibtion shows the work of
Richard Baxter,
Julie O'Sullivan,
Sheila Appleton,
Ian Smith and
Joe Spurgeon, all based at
Old Leigh Studios. The exhibition explores the personal and emotional connections they all have to the life, colours and textures of the Thames Estuary, and to the tidal nature of its shoreline. See more of Appleton and Smith's work in their online exhibition,
A View of Retrospection. I was glad to catch up briefly with Richard Baxter, who was part of
commission4mission for a time. He makes finely thrown porcelain in distinctively bright, bold and beautiful colours and favours forms with simple clean profiles reminiscent of mid-century-modern Scandinavian ceramics. On each piece he varies the curves and applies the bands of bronze pigment to fit each form, so every pot is unique.
Jennie Sharman-Cox and Simon Monk - Double Take: Jennie Sharman-Cox and
Simon Monk are two artists living and working in the Southend area. Their outlook and activities are quite distinct, the former working predominantly in three dimensions while the latter produces paintings and drawings. Despite these essential differences there are notable areas of common ground, the meticulously crafted nature of their work being the most clear. Both artists invent fictional worlds for the viewer to enter and inhabit, Jennie through the use of immersive box constructions and Simon through trompe l’oeil illusion. Jennie and Simon are both Southend natives and perhaps something of the culture of the British seaside resort in which they grew up, with its novelties and amusements, remains present in their work. For this exhibition both artists are presenting a body of new and recent work as well as selections from their studio archives. To mark the occasion of the show Jennie and Simon have each produced a new piece responding to the the Beecroft Gallery building and its history as a library.
Colour 2: This exhibition explores the use of colour within painting, sculpture and sound. The power of colour has fascinated psychologists, philosophers, chemists and artists for hundreds of years, with certain colours long being associated with class, status and authority within many cultures. The emotion colour can evoke within us has encouraged many artists to consider the way they are using colour and why. Utilising the Beecroft Art Gallery collection in conjunction with loans from Essex University and
Essex Collection of Art from Latin America ESCALA, this exhibition aims to explore the way colour has been used, the narrative of particular colours, and the power colour holds. The exhibition includes some great works by significant artists including
Roderick Barrett,
Allin Braund,
Canaletto,
William Crosbie,
David Hockney,
Elsa James,
Karólína Lárusdóttir,
John Nash,
Jacob van Ruisdael and
Carel Weight. I was particularly interested to see a painting by
George Morl, who will be showing his own art collection at
St Andrew's Wickford in May, as part of the
One Beautiful World Arts Festival.
Located on the lower floor of the Beecroft Art Gallery is
The Jazz Centre UK which celebrates jazz music’s heritage, and actively supports and promotes contemporary performance and education. The charity (No: 1167421) was registered in 2016 and founded by musician, broadcaster and writer Digby Fairweather. The organisation’s mission stated on the Charity Commission website is “To preserve promote and celebrate the art of jazz music in all its forms”. The Jazz Centre includes a walk-through history of jazz feature, a heritage museum, a performance space, research facilities, a media room, a cinema/lecture theatre and a retail outlet for jazz books and records.
The Rise and The Fall: Liz Magor is at
Focal Point Gallery Organised in collaboration with the Contemporary Art Gallery, Vancouver, the exhibition will subsequently tour to The Douglas Hyde Gallery of Contemporary Art, Dublin (14 July-24 September 2023) and Fondazione Giuliani, Rome (26 October 2023 – January 2024).
‘The Rise and The Fall,’ by Liz Magor presents a focused selection of works from the last five years that explore our relationship with the material world. Working with ubiquitous, manufactured objects that often go unnoticed, she transforms them using inventive sculptural techniques that locate them on a spectrum between still life and the uncanny. Things such as blankets, containers, clothing and toys are found in relationships that generate a sense of care and meaning beyond their original use or function. The exhibition offers a focused selection of work that consider Magor’s understanding of the presence of ‘agency’ within inanimate, material objects and her enquiry as to the source of their intrigue and emotional resonance. The way in which Magor’s work draws attention to discarded and apparently mundane objects, seems particularly relevant to current discussions about the economy of things and the role of material in our social, political and psychological lives.
Focal Point Gallery is South Essex’s only public contemporary art gallery, open to all. Offering an exciting and ambitious programme of largely free workshops, talks, outdoor film screenings and offsite projects, they also present four major exhibitions a year featuring both international and local artists. Their aim is to inspire curiosity by producing and presenting thought-provoking art made today that explores our locality, sense of self and the importance of communities through investigating current concerns that resonate internationally.
Prittlewell Priory was founded by the Cluniac Order in the early 12th century as a cell to the Priory of St Pancras at Lewes, Sussex. It was one of the lesser monasteries housing not more than 18 monks. In 1536 much of the building was destroyed and what remained was much altered during the 18th Century. Alterations were made again in the early 20th Century, when the Refectory was restored and partly rebuilt. A number of original features do survive, including a 12th Century doorway with chevron and dog tooth ornamentation. After the Dissolution the Priory was a private residence and it was granted to Lord Chancellor Audley, who conveyed it to Robert, son of Lord Rich. It afterwards passed with the manor to various families. The last family to live there, the 19th Century Scrattons, are explored in an exhibition inside the house. In 1917 the building was purchased by Robert Jones, and in May 1922 it opened as Southend's first museum.
In 2011 works began on refurbishing the existing buildings and the construction of a new Visitor Centre. The £2 million works were in part funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund and the Cory Environmental Trust in Southend and were undertaken by The Facility Architects and Ibex Interiors. Works were completed in the summer of 2012 and the Priory re-opened in the June of that year. The new Visitor Centre, adjacent to the Priory, opened in February 2013.
St Catherine's Wickford has a possible connection to Prittlewell Priory as the chancel ceiling is reputed to have come from the Priory Refectory.
‘Totems of Hope’ by
Heidi Wigmore was funded by an Arts Council England ‘Developing your Creative Practice’ award in 2021 for Prittlewell Priory.
Wigmore writes:
"The work functions as an installation of seven 1m x 1.5m textile banners, they symbolise a resurrection of the creative spirit; they are ‘guardians’, a force for hope and unity in an increasingly fractured world.
Sacred banners have long been used as a symbolic tool to communicate the spiritual realm and to celebrate revival and regeneration. I visualise them imparting a grandiose impact in heritage spaces.
The imagery evolved from an analogue collage series evoking the ‘Sacred Feminine’; images of transformation and empowerment reference both modern and classical mythologies, synthesizing ancient Western and Eastern cultural traditions as hybrid ‘totems’. Sources include medieval religious paintings and icons, Tudor/Baroque era royal portraiture, and myriad sculptural and symbolic/natural forms.
The banners incorporate sumptuous velvet and damask fabrics, hand-constructed with all their human imperfections alongside the precision of cutting-edge digital technologies; a fusion of tradition and the contemporary. Embroidered motifs, reminiscent of the Ecclesiastical, are partly deconstructed by my interventions with the machinery."
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