Bohemian rhapsody: Alessandro Raho on Hastings as arts hotspot

27 October 2014

The Chapman Brothers’ In the Realm of the Unmentionable exhibition at the Jerwood Gallery has put hipsters on notice that Hastings should now be considered a serious art destination.

But beyond the south coast town’s famous siblings there is a thriving artistic community, with a host of galleries, shops and studios, and a number of respected practitioners based locally.

Here one of those, Alessandro Raho – nominee for the 2014 John Moores Painting Prize – explains why Hastings is the Shoreditch of East Sussex.

All photographs and paintings © Alessandro Raho

“Artists are moving to Hastings” – that’s what people are saying. An influx of creative people is supposed to be a barometer for the regeneration of an area. But is it true?

Norman Road

Actually it is: there are a lot of artists here on the south coast. My family and I moved here a few years ago, probably for similar reasons to many others.

It’s cheap compared to London, for a start; but more than that, the houses are gorgeous - usually a bit dilapidated but big, full of character, and with a sense of faded glamour. They’re wonderful places to imagine living, with great possibilities for studio space.

The most important thing – and this might be why it appeals to artists – is that there is the chance of a more satisfying work/life balance. We’ve met lots of people who’ve moved from London or Brighton and are much happier here.

Liz Gilmore, the director of the Jerwood Gallery, talks about there being an undercurrent of arts people here and that’s a good way to describe it.

Portrait of Bryan Ferry

Illustrator Quentin Blake has had a house in the Old Town for many years, and the conceptual artist John Stezaker recently bought a property here too.

There are those that have been here for a long time, like Gus Cummins, part of a community of artists who have made Hastings their home.

I was told that Gus’s house was once stayed in by infamous Satanist Aleister Crowley – a good story, I hope it’s true!

And painter Stephen Buckley also lives in the town – his close friend Bryan Ferry was the subject of one of my own portraits.

The Arts Forum is a gallery and meeting place that’s a big part of the Hastings art community and an important part of its social connection.

And on the other side of town is the Jerwood – a beautiful building, built among the famous Hastings fishermen’s net huts, and very sympathetic to them.

The Jerwood has been a very big deal for the Hastings scene. It gives the area a sense of weight and focus that would otherwise be missing. It’s got a great programme too, focusing on British art with unusual shows such as the Jeffery Camp exhibition.

The Jerwood has been a very big deal for the Hastings scene

As well as putting on important shows for a local and national audience, it hosts a monthly meet for artists of the area, organised by Matthew Burrows and Gerard Hemsworth.

It’s a good chance for fellow artists to gossip and catch up, enhancing the sense of community that is very much part of Hastings.

It’s also great having the De La Warr Pavilion just down the road in Bexhill. I was lucky to be part of a really interesting painting show that Dan Howard-Birt and David Rhodes curated recently, called I Cheer a Dead Man’s Sweetheart.

The Jerwood has just opened a major new exhibition from two local boys, the Chapman Brothers, who spent part of their youth in Hastings.

Dinos remembers Hastings being very divided between different social groups – punks, rockers, and the most aggressive in his opinion: casuals. He and his brother Jake spent a lot of time being chased by these groups – but he also remembers that he loved Hastings.

It was great to see the brothers again at the opening. I first met them years ago at the famous Brilliant! show in Minneapolis. Jake was very nice to me – I was the odd one out in that show in as much as I wasn't really part of the YBA generation, they were all a bit older – and I've liked him ever since.

Away from the Jerwood, Louise Colbourne is a curator and artist also at the initial stages of setting up an arts space, having brought an old bank. She and her husband, the artist Paul Burgess, are also involved in helping the University of Brighton expand their Hastings campus from 700 to 2,000 students – a dramatic increase which will have a big impact on the town.

Electro Studios

Coastal Currents is an ambitious performance festival that also connects with the fantastic sense of civic ritual that exists in Hastings. It’s been amazing to witness the mass participation in events like Jack in the Green and Pirate Day. People love dressing up here – there are some very serious pirate costumes on the day!

There is also a very rich photographic community here. Photology, a monthly talk in the Bullet coffee house basement run by Alex Brattell, is much enthused about by the artist Becky Beasley, also a Hastings resident. Sean O’Hagan, the Guardian photography writer who lives in the Old Town, recently gave a talk there.

There is so much going on here, from the Electro Studios in St Leonards and the much-loved Wayward haberdashery shop on Norman Road to the Black Huts writing and filmmaking festival and Project Art Works and Active Arts, local organisations working with people with severe intellectual impairments and learning disabilities.

The list could go on and on. It’s great that none of them are prescribed – they are mostly artist-run and have happened naturally through a genuine desire.

There’s a part of St Leonards called Bohemia – and it’s true that there is a genuine bohemian spirit in Hastings.