Sussex Modernism at Towner Eastbourne is a complex show that breaks out of its historical box to include contemporary artists and work, which displays the context out of which the artists emerge, but the main focus is on the interwar art. This is the heart of the exhibition. I don’t know if the main works are particularly amplified by the inclusion of the works, but I like a thoughtful hang. This hang is indeed very elegant and pleasurable in itself, and it gives the show a vibrancy for the classic period to be in conversation with artists of the present.
The exciting thing for me about Modernism, is the celebration of abstract qualities and the rise of 2D design that integrates with representation. It is an oversimplification of what feels like a complex and subliminal emotional response to this art, but it also sums up what feels important about Modernism. I like the association of British Modernism with other wider ways of thinking, but as a visual artist and writer, it is the new high purpose of abstraction that initially attracted me and kept me interested.
Unusually for my taste, I was taken by some of the textile works, with their artisanal beauty. The relationship of pretty minimal craft with mass production and the presence of these leading makers in the London scene and the decorative arts of the 1930s.
One of the finds to me was the work of Margaret Benecke. Her unsaturated colour palette and the arrangement of 2D shapes to represent 3D reality really seem to encapsulate some of the brown light of English rural reality. It is a quiet, atmospheric Sussex that she paints, but it feels subliminal and I was impressed by her handling of light and form and arrangement of shape in space. I feel that I am looking at the world through her eyes, seeing with her vision when I explore her oeuvre. This is surely one of the main desired effects of a show like this: to bring overlooked artists into view. The Towner is a repository of work by the Eastbourne artist and a useful film about her life and work, and the relationship with her famous grandfather Felix Mendelssohn with with Dr Jane Palmer is on the screenarchive site at Brighton University.
Remarkable contemporary works include paintings by Sussex-based artists, such as the exceptional painter Geraldine Swayne and the Neo-naturalist Jennifer Binnie, whose tall figure in the landscape hangs comfortably next to a Burne-Jones, basking in the association.
The Jacob Epstein sculptures are powerful, and their neo-Roman brutal stares dominate the exhibition. ‘Sun Goddess Crouching’ (c. 1910) in limestone shows the sun goddess, an important figure in Baltic mythology, a special interest of mine. This appears to be a sun goddess giving birth, whereas in Latvian stories, Saule is more commonly represented as a godmother. This sun goddess grabs her ankles as her child is born from the seated position, contrary to the medical advice for childbirth at this period, which was to lie down. This position asserts a pagan wisdom above and beyond bookish orthodoxy. My circle discussed childbirth and how this was represented in this sculpture by Epstein, who worked at this time with Ditchling-based artist Eric Gill on an idea to make a ‘twentieth-century Stonehenge’ comprising ‘colossal figures’ carved in stone. This was to be placed in Virginia Wolf’s first house in Sussex but was never realised.
Pett Level is an important location in this exhibition. It was where Jacob Epstein resided from 1913 to 1915. It is where David Bowie shot his ‘Ashes to Ashes’ video in 1980, a classic of the music video age and which is shown here as part of the resonance of this show.
One Edward Burra watercolour is part of the show, and this is remarkable, with the figures and clothes stepping out of a remarkable colour composition.
Overall, the show could be a little jumbled, yet it has been saved from appearing like this by such an intelligent and expressive hang. It is a worthwhile visit, primarily for the Sussex Modernist works included but also because you surely will never see such a mixed exhibition again with a bold purpose. And the Epstein sculptures are phenomenal.
Sussex Modernism, Towner Eastbourne, 23 May – 28 September 2025
Visit Here