Towner Gallery, Eastbourne.
Something for the weekend # 04
A couple of weeks ago Rock Cakes received it’s first wholesale order from the Towner gallery, I had been intending to visit for a while and this was the perfect excuse to go.
After the excitement of my daughters first journey on a train we arrived in sunny Easbourne, just 30mins by rail from Brighton, we made the ten minute walk to the Towner Gallery. The gallery opened in April last year and offers a sophisticated programme of both historic and contemporary exhibitions and also runs events and tours. The building itself is vast and reminds me of the Tate in St Ives, a refreshing change in comparison to most of the galleries in this area.
The entrance is by the gift shop and so after purchasing a pencil to add to my “pencils in bags” collection and checking out the Rock Cakes merchandise, we caught the biggest lift i think i have ever been in and visited the Artist Room on the second floor, the first floor was closed as there was an exhibition change over. Photographs by Robert Mapplethorpe were on display, a show which is running until 21st November 2010, it was great to see some truly iconic portraits including those of Andy Warhol and Grace Jones, as well as some sculptural work, huge mirror stars hung on the wall. I was warned by a staff member that some of the pictures are explicit, I’m not sure if they were concerned for me or Matilda but being six months old she was more interested in the echo when she screamed as loud as she could, we didn’t stay long.
We did however manage to have a cup of tea, a piece of cake and a nose on the cafe balcony before catching the lift back down to the ground floor, an elderly couple caught it with us and were a little dismayed at the use of space in the gallery, I think it was all a bit too modern for their liking but perfectly refreshing to me.
01/10/2010
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