Towner Times Winter 2009 for Print.Indd
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THE TOWNER No. 71 Winter 2009 TIMES Towner’s descendants visit the new gallery Grayson Perry’s generous gift Ca mpaign to save the old Towner building Latest events and information www.friendsofthetowner.org.uk THE TOWNER TIMES THE TOWNER Welcome No. 71 Winter 2009 TIMES to the winter issue On the cover: Amy Reeve-Fowkes (18 86-196 8) Contents Eastbourne Front in a Storm,19 30 Towner’s descendants visit the new gallery Watercolour and Grayson Perry’s generous gift pencil on paper FEATURES Ca mpaign to save the old Towner building Latest events and information Interview It’s a triumph for the Towners! 4 www.friendsofthetowner.org.uk Latest information Towner news 7 Ol d Towner Project Helen Warren 8 Towner staff interview Marie Thompson 10 IT SEEMS THAT WITHIN THE NEXT YEAR Local life The art of contemporary living 12 there will be a change of governance at Towner with the creation of a charitable LOCAL ARTIST PROFILE trust charged with the task of running the Viv Cecil 14 gallery and determining its future strategic PREVIOUS EVENTS & EXHIBITIONS direction. The move will bring certain Ne w acquisition Map of Nowhere 16 financial advantages but, arguably of Towner reviews greater importance, will be the opportunity A Different View 18 to appoint a trust board who are fully New exhibition 19 dedicated to the development of the gallery. Friends’ reviews The Friends will watch with interest and we Meng Yang Pan 20 look forward to working closely with the Julian Lloyd Webber 21 new body if and when it is established. In FRIENDS’ EVENTS the meantime our membership continues Joining up Join the Friends! 22 to grow and the new-look Towner Times Events calendar 23 has been an important factor in this. Enjoy Bill Allison Art talk 24 this issue and please pass on the word Val Wiseman Jazz evening 25 about membership - we have ambitious James Woods-Davison Music evening 26 plans for growth! Robert Milnes Literary evening 27 May I wish you all a very happy Christmas Anthony Slinn Ar t talk 28 and here’s to an exciting New Year! Timothy Orpen Music evening 29 Friends’ noticeboard Own your own art 30 Geoffrey Williams Online funds Help to make more money 1 3 Chairman Winter 2009 3 INTERVIEW It’s a triumph for the Towners! We talk to the actor Clive Francis and his mother, Margaret Towner, great niece of the gallery’s founder By Frances Lloyd OBE I ENTERED THE FOYER OF TOWNER to curator, Sara Cooper kindly gave the find the prominent actor, Clive Francis, three of us a conducted tour and it was and his mother waiting for me. Clive is a wonderful to watch our guests’ faces light distinguished stage and screen actor and up on seeing paintings they hadn’t seen also a renowned caricaturist and book for years. Clearly they were familiar with illustrator while his mother, Margaret the works, had never forgotten them and Towner, a fellow thespian, is the great niece were glad to see them playing to a new of Alderman Towner who made the original audience. However, Clive and Margaret Towner bequest. It was her father, Eric, who are nothing if not open-minded and came up with the idea of using the Manor they were equally interested in the new House to house the original collection. It works – particularly the imposing bone was their first visit to the new gallery and chandeliers (Jodie Carey’s work In the Eyes I was delighted to accompany them. of Others) in the Exhibition Gallery, which were on display on our visit. Family life Eventually I was able to sit the two of them down and gather some of their memories... The family home was High Bank in Borough Lane, almost opposite the old Towner. The building used by the Towner was built about 1776 by the Reverend Henry Lushington, Vicar of Eastbourne. The house Photo: Janet Taylor was bought for use as Eastbourne’s Art Gallery with the help of £6,000 and the The old and new collection of pictures, given by Alderman Clive and Margaret were most impressed Towner. Near the gallery are the steps by the scale of the building – ‘A bit different from High Street into Manor Gardens, the from the old Manor House,’ said Margaret gardens of the former Gildredge Manor with a twinkle in her eye. Clive had hoped House. When the Art Gallery opened to that the Towner name would be retained the public in 1923, the permanent fine and was absolutely delighted to see it art collection consisted of 22 Victorian writ large wherever he looked. Collection paintings. Today the Towner Co llection 4 Th e Towner Times boasts in excess of 4,000 works of historic, children and their young friends – among modern and contemporary art. them Clive Francis. In the winter, there were skating parties with the children As Margaret and Clive reminisced, out sliding over the highly polished floors past came tumbling all the legendary names. the magnificent art on the walls. Memories of the Reeve-Fowkes family (the Towner’s first curator) and coming back Margaret was a founder member of the to the house after a day on the beach Eastbourne Shakespearean Society, which during the summer holiday and playing gave open-air performances in Manor games like hide-and-seek and sardines in Gardens and where Clive gave his first a house full of nooks and crannies, ideally Shakespearean performance as Longueville suited to childrens’ games. John Gascoigne in Love’s Labour’s Lost. The gardens boasted Lake (curator, 194 7-57) lived in a flat in three gardeners who Clive describes as the Manor House with his family and the ‘straight out of Alice in Wonderland’ and as gallery and gardens provided a home and a boy he spent many hours drinking hot, a workplace and also a playground for his sweet tea with them in their little w Winter 2009 5 INTERVIEW ‘My great, great uncle would have been overwhelmed with pride at the outcome of his original £6,000 bequest’ hideaway hut. The head gardener, Mr Catt, Clive could recall the lamp-lighter going who always seemed to wear a suit, was along Borough Lane and an odd but vivid a very patient and understanding man, memory of a man who wore heavy boots though his patience wore thin on occasions walking to the Eastbourne Dental Board through the many pranks that Clive and his offices in the morning, the boots making a friends got up to. curious and distinctive sound on the stones, Clive’s cue for getting ready for school. Both Margaret and Clive remembered the Eastbourne Art School which used to stand Here’s to Towner where the Library is now. William Gear, Eric It was a great pleasure to meet Clive Ravilious, Edward Burra, John Lake and Francis and Margaret Towner. Clive wrote Donald Towner all came to mind in this to me after their visit and I thought I would context with many of them going on to end with his words. ‘My great, great uncle the Royal Academy together. Both were would have been overwhelmed with pride at pleased about the recent Edward Bawden the outcome of his original £6,000 bequest. purchase by Towner as he too was I love the modern design and the space and well remembered. hope the Eastbournians take it to their hearts and embrace this new and exciting gallery. It’s a triumph for us Towners. It’s a triumph for Art and it’s a triumph for Eastbourne!’ Hear, hear! Right: The Pool of London, 1935, by Donald Towner, oil on canvas; far right: The Bird Trap, 1851, by Henry Dawson, oil on canvas 6 Th e Towner Times LATEST INFORMATION Towner news All you need to know from the gallery Calling all artists TOWNER IS INVITING applications for its first East Sussex Open exhibition in April 2010 . This exciting opportunity is open to local artists living or working in East Sussex and will take place in conjunction with the Eastbourne Festival. The exhibition is open to artists and Photo: Daniel Clements makers working in any media – including painting, drawing, sculpture, installation and photography. The selected works will be showcased in Towner’s vast ground floor Exhibition Halls. The deadline for entries is midday Monday 11 January 2010 and the Design winners exhibition runs from 3 April to 3 May. Towner has scooped two top design prizes: Find out more and download an entry form Architect of the Year Aw ard for Public from www.eastbourne.gov.uk/towner. Buildings from Building Design magazine Exhibitions still running... for Rick Mather Architects, followed by Architectural Achievement Award in the ■ ...until the beginning of January Diane 2009 Elle Decoration British Design Awards. Thater’s Tigers and Other People show Well done Rick and his team for creating in the Exhibition Gallery. Tigers are the such a stunning building! subject matter of this three-screen video installation, providing light and colour that Forthcoming exhibition somehow transcends the natural world. The Dark Monarch Free entry. 23 January to 23 March ■ ...until next April A Different View in Visiting from Tate St Ives this exhibition the Collection Gallery. It gives work from explores the influences of mythology, the Collection its first outing in the new folklore, mysticism and the occult on building and shows different takes on modern British art development. specific themes – see page 18 . Free entry. Ticketed entry. Winter 2009 7 OLD TOWNER PROJECT Helen Warren Help save the old Towner! HELEN WARREN IS A LOCAL RESIDENT and made good roof tiles and put felt to replace artist on a mission.