FRESH AiR 18

10–11 February, 17–18 February, 24–25 February, 12 noon–4pm

Three artists, three weekends, three presentations of new and experimental work developed in the gallery space during a series of one-week micro-residencies. Facilitated by curator Alex Grey.

CLIFF CRAWFORD: WAVEWORN

First Friday Private View: Friday 2 March, 6pm
Exhibition: Saturday 3 March–Friday 23 March, 12 noon–5pm (Thu–Sun)

Bexhill artist Cliff Crawford documents weathering and erosion on the Sussex coast through the medium of film and stills photography, catalogued by location and date to build up a complete and beautiful archive of change over the decades. Waveworn explores pressing issues of environmental instability, but also timeless human themes of change, impermanence and desire for (the illusion of) control.

NOW WE ARE 7: CHANGE & DISRUPT

First Friday Private View: Friday 6 April, 6pm
Exhibition: Saturday 7 April–Friday 27 April, 12 noon–5pm (Thu–Sun)

In 2016, women’s art collective Now We Are 7, comprising artists Lyn Dale, Nikki Davidson-Bowman, Louise Michele Evans, Marie Ford, Stephanie Grainger, Jules Mitchell and Katy Oxborrow, set out on an experimental journey. Each artist made one piece of work and each month the work changed hands until each artist had contributed towards each piece. In a process of palimpsest, the work evolved or was reused or altered but potentially still bore visible traces of its earlier form. During the year of the project, the artists experienced their own changes and disruptions, in the form of relocation, separation, illness, loss and uncertainty. The result is a body of work that reflects themes of female identity, diversity and transition.

ALISON ALLUM: IN HER SHOES

Private View: Friday 4 May, 6pm
Exhibition: 5–25 May, 12 noon–5pm (Thu–Sun)

Experimental glass artist Alison Allum exploits her medium’s qualities of allure, fragility and danger to explore the contradictory experiences of modern womanhood. Combining classic beauty with a knowing theatricality, her collection of glass shoes and drawings portrays a much fetishised aspect of femininity and tempers it with an undercurrent of radicalism and wit.

PATRICIA THORNTON: MAPS AND DREAMS

Private View: Friday 1 June, 6pm
Exhibition: 2–22 June, 12 noon–5pm (Thu–Sun)

A former FRESH AiR artist-in-residence, painter Pat Thornton has built her new collection around news media images of conflict and displacement to explore the interplay between journeys both literal and figurative.

AFRICA 21

Private View: Friday 6 July, 6pm
Exhibition: 7–27 July, 12 noon–5pm (Thu–Sun)

Rejecting the clichéd roles imposed upon the continent of Africa by Western culture and media, Africa 21 is a group exhibition of photography that reframes 21st century Africa as a mature, upwardly-mobile destination as well as a naturally beautiful one – a continent that has come of age.

Africa 21 is generously supported by Cedarberg Travel.

MARTYRS’ SUMMER SALON

Private View: Friday 17 August, 6pm
Exhibition: 18 August–2 September, 12 noon–5pm (Thu–Sun, plus Bank Holiday Monday)

Martyrs’ juried summer show returns to present a cross-section of contemporary two- and three-dimensional art. Artists wishing to submit work should ask in the gallery or visit www.martyrs.gallery/summersalon.

The Summer Salon is part of the Lewes Artwave Festival. For more information, visit www.artwavefestival.org.

COOP presents U TURN

Saturday 15 & Sunday 16 September ONLY (12 noon–5pm)

coop are Clio Lloyd-Jacob and Andrew James, an artist duo who work collaboratively in the space between drawing, projection and animation. U turn, a work created specifically for Martyrs’ Gallery, features a lone filmed foot, a dislocated limb separated from the body of work they have created for an exhibition at Anglia Ruskin Gallery, Cambridge later this year. The animated digital work and drawn elements will be accompanied by an extended performance that, though minimal, will form a dialogue with real-time changes in the animation.

VIVIENNE LYNN: PRESENCE OF ABSENCE/ABSENCE OF PRESENCE

Private View: Friday 5 October, 6pm
Exhibition: 6–26 October, 12 noon–5pm (Thu–Sun)

Artist, researcher and critical theorist Vivienne Lynn opens up new perspectives and conversations on dementia via a matrix of visual evidence of a person’s existence, to explore themes of time, space, memory and trace.

SOMETHING GLOWING AND ALIVE: WORKS BY CHAGALL, PIPER & SUTHERLAND

Private View: Friday 9 November, 6pm
Exhibition: 10 November–16 December, 12 noon–5pm (Thu–Sun)

We are delighted to present in association with Goldmark Gallery an exhibition of prints, lithographs and original drawings by Marc Chagall, John Piper and Graham Sutherland, three luminaries of twentieth-century art whose work was famously commissioned by Walter Hussey for Chichester Cathedral.

All Martyrs’ profits from sales at this exhibition will be donated to the organ restoration fund at St Michael’s Church, Lewes.