It’s grown from 22 paintings to a trailblazing gallery that’s celebrating its centenary year by hosting the Turner Prize – but Towner Eastbourne’s biggest achievement is being the pride of its seaside resort’s community
When it was announced in the summer of 2022 that this year’s Turner Prize would be held at Towner Eastbourne, it came as little surprise. At least not to anyone who has visited and followed the story of the oldest gallery on England’s southeast coast. The trailblazing treasury celebrates an extraordinary anniversary this year, marking its centenary with the Towner 100 programme.
Beginning with a bequest of 22 paintings in 1923, the Towner Collection now contains around 5,000 works, much of it reflecting Sussex’s undulated landscape, from the velvety South Downs to the chalky cliffs. Towner Eastbourne’s director, Joe Hill, will soon celebrate his own anniversary, having joined the gallery in March 2018. Originally trained as an artist, Joe quickly moved to curation, working on exhibitions in London before turning his attention to the glorious southeast.
‘I’ve always wanted to challenge perceptions, so Eastbourne naturally caught my eye,’ he tells Sussex Life. ‘I wanted to remove these old notions of it being known as ‘God's waiting room’ and its ‘Zimmer frames down the seafront’ vibe. That image simply isn’t true, there are lots of families and a big creative community in Eastbourne.’
If you’ve wandered by Towner’s emblazoned gallery since 2019, the bold exterior artwork — Dance Diagonal by UK-based German artist Lothar Götz — will likely have stopped you in your tracks. The dazzling mural was Joe’s first project for Towner. It was a commission to celebrate the gallery’s ten-year anniversary at its College Road location, while simultaneously creating a piece of public art for the community.
‘It was an important commission because it was about starting a project for the people that live here,’ Joe says. ‘This is a site to be proud of. That artwork has definitely done a good job of becoming iconic.’
The mural, a magnetic rupture of colour, has been shared eight million times (and counting) on social media, though the bold concept wasn’t always a welcome one in the community. ‘The commission was really about getting away from Eastbourne’s old image and doing something vibrant, colourful and fun that everyone can enjoy,’ Joe explains.
‘When we proposed the idea locally, everyone hated it. We received letters saying: “You can’t do that, it will ruin this institution”. But the building was very imposing, a towering white castle of culture and by commissioning this work, it has softened the outside, made it warm and more inviting.’
In Dance Diagonal’s first year, the gallery drew a record audience of 175,000 visitors. Initially planned for one year, the mural remains in place and is set to stay until at least 2024. ‘We completely underestimated the impact it would have and now if we talk about changing it people get really angry about that,’ Joe says. ‘I’m not saying it will definitely go in 2024, but we will review it. I think there’s life left in it yet. Whatever we decide to do, I don’t think we could ever go back to a white exterior again.’
Towner Eastbourne is deeply embedded in the community, with a programme that triumphantly represents Eastbourne as a vibrant and interesting place to live and visit. ‘The gallery’s name changed from the Towner Gallery to Towner Eastbourne to really celebrate this place; whether that be championing the fantastic landscape or amazing seafront or some of the creative artists who have lived in and around Eastbourne,’ Joe says.
‘Making it more embedded in the story of Eastbourne and what people love about it has helped to get the story of the Towner out there further.'
Eastbourne will remain front and centre of Towner 100 celebrations with a series of free exhibitions at the gallery and events around the town. This kick-started with The Living Collection, which debuted in December and will continue through until August.
That collection considers Towner’s history of collecting over the past 100 years, with works by the likes of Eric Ravilious, famous for his South Downs paintings, alongside artists such as Vanessa Bell, Gertrude Hermes and Edward Wadsworth. Towner 100: Unseen will follow (11 February to 14 May), examining what a public art collection looks like in the 21st century. The gallery’s newer acquisitions, including paintings, photography and installations, will be shown by artists such as Rachel Jones, Roland Jarvis and Dineo Seshee Bopape.
‘The first [exhibition] will look at the history and the stories of the Towner Collection, some of the mad moments and crazy curators. We’re very much using the past to think about what the future role of this gallery in the next 100 years will be,’ says Joe.
Towner Eastbourne has also secured a large summer retrospective of 20th-century sculptor Barbara Hepworth’s work, Life and Art (27 May to 3 September), which will be a ticketed event. This exhibition is particularly exciting for the southeast since Hepworth’s works are more often shown in Yorkshire and Cornwall, where the artist was born and died, respectively. ‘She’s probably one of the best or better-known 20th-century artists so to bring this to Eastbourne and the southeast is really exciting,’ he adds.
At the top of Towner Eastbourne’s shopping list when it came to planning the centenary celebrations was the prestigious Turner Prize. ‘There’s a bidding process you have to go through alongside other towns, cities and institutions and we were delighted to get it,’ says Joe.
The exhibition will run from 28 September 2023 to 14 January 2024 — climaxing with the announcement of the winner on 5 December — forming the centrepiece of the Towner 100 programme.
Shortlisted artists for the Turner Prize will be announced this spring by the jury panel which includes Martin Clark, Director, Camden Art Centre; Cédric Fauq, Chief Curator, Capc musée d’art contemporain de Bordeaux; Melanie Keen, Director of Wellcome Collection and Helen Nisbet, Artistic Director, Art Night.
The gallery hopes to draw 250,000 visitors through its doors this year. If it succeeds, it will be Towner’s biggest-ever audience. ‘Our record year was 2019 with 175,000 visitors. The building was only designed to welcome 100,000 so we are already well exceeding that, so it’s been important to carry out works to improve the spaces,’ Joe says.
Updates include a new cafe and restaurant opening this April to complement the recently refurbished ground floor space. ‘The new restaurant space will be all about celebrating the food of Sussex with a chef’s menu. We still plan for it to be affordable and accessible, but it should improve the food offering at the gallery.’
Joe reveals that public art will also be displayed around Eastbourne with pieces commissioned as part of the gallery’s Levelling Up initiative. ‘We are working with two commissions in the east of the town, in some of the more deprived communities within Eastbourne. Another piece of public art will be on display on the seafront, which will be an emblem of Eastbourne that people can seek out.’
Towner Eastbourne is also working with its partners in the town and beyond, including Arts Council England, to bring festivities across the seaside resort. ‘The plan is to have commissions on the High Street, in the train station and the seafront, to really make it vibrant and exciting. This will be alongside a music programme in the Winter Garden and live music across the town,’ Joe says.
‘We’re also encouraging our partners outside of Eastbourne such as De La Warr Pavilion [in Bexhill-on-Sea] to have a really strong programme during that period to encourage people to stay longer in Eastbourne and Sussex.’
Funding from Arts Council England and Eastbourne Borough Council is critical to new public art projects and keeping much of the gallery’s programming free. ‘They allow us to be creative and do projects like the work on the outside of the building,’ Joe says. ‘Without the funding, we would have to flip to a more commercial model, which we wouldn’t want to do.’
A new venue, Black Robin Farm, is set to debut in 2025/2026 in the Downland community of Beachy Head. This new site will allow Towner Eastbourne to expand on what they already do, with more gallery space and scope to experiment with outside programming within the chalky landscape. Until then, there’s plenty to get excited about this year. ‘The biggest thing for me is that people locally feel proud of Towner Eastbourne,’ Joe smiles. ‘I’ve seen that feeling in the last few years and it feels like there’s been a shift. There’s pride in the gallery and it’s a real fabric of the town. With our centenary year, it feels like everybody wants to celebrate it with us.’
