Days Out in Sussex - Towner Eastbourne and David Nash

Congratulations to Towner Eastbourne, named Winner of Art Fund’s Museum of the Year 2020 and I can see why.

Days Out Sussex - Towner Eastbourne and David Nash photo by modernbricabrac

After becoming a fan of David Nash through his exhibition in Cardiff Museum, I took myself off to Eastbourne to see his work for the second time at the Towner art gallery.

Even though I love old buildings, when I arrived at Towner I was blown away by the building's exterior. Bold and bright, it's a riot of colour lighting up Eastbourne. Inside, the industrial interior extends along oblong corridors, that end with large glass windows.

In Eastbourne, David Nash's exhibition looked even more at home than it did in the lofty rooms of the grand Edwardian Cardiff Museum. The smell of wood subtly infused the air while the wood sculptures, charred, moulded, re-imagined, and carved filled the exhibition rooms and covered the walls. The scale of many of his works are impressive in size. To see his work feels like a reconnection with an ancestral veneration of trees.

While I was at the gallery, Towner beckoned me upstairs to see more of its treasures. There I found some paintings by local artist Eric Ravilious, who I have become more and more drawn to. I now follow a Twitter account that posts a daily Ravilious painting and it seems it's not just me who has become entranced.

Towner Eastbourne's accolade comes from the Art Fund, which is considered the most prestigious museum prize in the world. The other winning museums were: Aberdeen Art Gallery (Aberdeen, Scotland); Gairloch Museum (Gairloch, Scotland); Science Museum (London, England); South London Gallery (London, England); Towner Eastbourne(Eastbourne, Sussex, England). All were awarded based on achievements in 2019–20.

By coincidence, the Science museum is the other museum I have visited most recently this year.

Well done to all the winners!