If you want your visual senses to be numbed by the quality, revived by the beauty and then ripped apart by the drama of some of the images, then you don’t want to miss Hung, Drawn and Displayed at Horsham Museum & Art Gallery. If that wasn’t enough you can have the adrenalin rush of the auction process as you can enjoy the chase of buying your favourite piece on May 28th at Toovey’s Spring Gardens salerooms. In an exhibition featuring the work of sixty artists, including some of the regions most talented contemporary names, the visitor can, in the relaxed atmosphere of Horsham museum, enjoy seeing the contrast of 21st Century art in the relaxed atmosphere of the Causeway’s medieval timber-framed building.
Horsham Museum’s new Art Gallery was launched last year with Artventure, a preview exhibition of Toovey’s Contemporary Art Auction. It proved to be a great success, not only in showcasing work, but also in revealing that there was a desire in Horsham District for such an opportunity. The success of the show was such that Horsham Museum and Art Gallery were delighted to be able to repeat the opportunity. An opportunity where the public can enjoy spending hours looking at the works hung, drawn and displayed.
The exhibition and sale has been organised by Nicholas Toovey, sourcing emerging and established artists and craftsmen from across the region with an emphasis on the local scene. Nicholas has managed to pull together some amazing works by renowned artists including Chris Kettle whose painting Natura Sola Magistra, will be a talking point for visitors. Along with paintings are various craftsmen, some exhibiting for the first time, each merging the boundary between art and craft. No doubt tying people in to knots over the meaning of art, will be Horsham-based ceramicist Deborah Timperly, whose work Knotted and Hung will cause some debate.
The free exhibition Hung, Drawn and Displayed opens on Friday 8 April and runs till 11 May at Horsham Museum & Art Gallery. Two weeks later on 28 May all works displayed will be auctioned at Toovey’s, Washington. A fully-illustrated catalogue with more information on every artist is available from the museum, helping raise funds to enable it to buy contemporary art, preserving the present for the future.