Impact case study database

Wolf’s archival research led directly to the curation of two major exhibitions in London ( Sussex Modernism) and East Sussex ( A Tale of Mother’s Bones), that reframed the significance of the county’s modernist cultural heritage and contributed to reinvigorating a region with a ‘poor public perception’ due to its ‘political and geographical fragmentation’ [S1]. The first exhibition helped to reposition Sussex ‘as a rich cultural hub’ [S2], and its success was a ‘catalyst’ for investment in – and the development of – a professional museum and gallery network (‘Sussex Modern’) [S1, S3] and an art tourism trail across East Sussex and West Sussex. The result was increased audiences across the nine original partner venues and increased cultural tourism, particularly in East Sussex. A ‘Sussex Modern’ website ( www.sussexmodern.org.uk) and further investment followed, expanding the number of highlighted cultural destinations in the region to thirty-six.

Reframing Modernist Cultural Heritage with Sussex Museums and Galleries

I. Challenging Preconceptions. Central to the impact is the major exhibition researched and curated by Wolf, Sussex Modernism: Retreat and Rebellion, held at Two Temple Place in London (28/01/17 to 23/04/2017). For [text removed for publication] at Charleston, Wolf’s ‘wish to tell a “radical” rather than a “picture postcard” story of Sussex modernism really clinched the deal’ in securing the exhibition at Two Temple Place: a prestigious venue dedicated to bringing attention to regional collections. ‘[T]here was an anxiety that this was a story which was not fresh and that it wasn’t going to be a dynamic exhibition [...] Hope brought new stories to the table… her perspective on the stories […] and the new artists that she wanted to include in that story convinced Two Temple Place’ [S1]. It was also stated: ‘[Wolf’s] research, narratives and particular insight gave the exhibition the excitement and new ideas which were needed to achieve such great publicity for the county, our venues and the story of Modernism in Sussex, and to attract record numbers to the exhibition’ [S4].

This was the most popular exhibition the venue has ever staged. 52,597 visitors attended, many visiting the venue for the first time [S5], from at least 20 countries [S6a]. Sponsored by Arts Council England and the Bull Dog Trust, and supported by an education and events programme, the exhibition received coverage from national newspapers including: The Times, The New Statesman, and The Guardian (e.g. ‘The exhibition forces us to recalibrate our ideas about the artists and writers who dominated the radical cultural life of Britain 100 years ago’ – The i); art publications including Apollo and Wallpaper (e.g. ‘After visiting this show, you might think of Sussex differently’ – The RA Magazine); and regional media including BBC South East [S7]. It was also reported in The New York Review of Books [S7]. Wolf newly and unusually combined collections drawn from regional museums, galleries and archives: Charleston, Ditchling Museum of Art & Craft, Pallant House Gallery, Towner Gallery, West Dean House, Jerwood Gallery, Brighton Museum and Art Gallery, Farleys House & Gallery, the De La Warr Pavilion, Bexhill Museum and the Keep. Building on the exhibition’s success, nine of these institutions formalised their connection, launching the ‘Sussex Modern’ network.

The exhibition and its underpinning research facilitated new collaborative approaches to local cultural heritage and the foregrounding of new narratives: ‘Lending works to Sussex Modernism enabled [Pallant House] to promote the gallery and its collection in a very particular way, underlining local connections and placing lesser known artists in context – visitors were able to more immediately see these connections and explore the cultural heritage of a specific area’ [S2]. Farleys House & Gallery saw Wolf’s ‘clever selection’ as underscoring their collection’s importance among the ‘big hitters’: she was ‘introducing Farleys’ [S8]. Placing objects in a new context (the Mae West Lips Sofa transported from Brighton Museum & Art Gallery to Two Temple Place) offered a way of ‘reinvigorating’ collections [S9], and her selection of previously unseen work by Duncan Grant was a significant step in Charleston opening up its ‘queer stories’: ‘they weren’t stories which had been told before, but since Hope’s inclusion of them within the exhibition they are stories which we are increasingly researching and telling in our on-going work’ [S1].

II. New Perspectives. Wolf was able to develop many of these themes further when she was invited by the De La Warr Pavilion to research and curate with the Head of Exhibitions a show on two artists whose work was briefly presented in Sussex Modernism but who had barely featured in histories of the region at all: Grace Pailthorpe and Reuben Mednikoff. Built upon Wolf’s discoveries made in their underexplored archives, A Tale of Mother’s Bones (2018-20) toured between venues in the three regions in which the artists lived and worked: Sussex (De La Warr Pavilion), London (Camden Arts Centre) and Cornwall (Newlyn Art Gallery and the Exchange). The Sussex and London shows attracted 23,371 and 21,792 visitors each [S10], and the exhibition received excellent reviews/previews in The Spectator (‘British Surrealism at its most remarkable and nightmarish’), ArtLyst (‘Every so often a strange, worthwhile show manifests itself at one of the galleries on Britain’s South Coast – an area increasingly beginning to replace Chelsea, or, after that Southwark and Bermondsey as a refuge for artists’), Apollo, Frieze, Tate etc, Art Agenda, The Financial Times, The Guardian, and The Telegraph [S11].

The show contributed to the continuing reframing of the cultural heritage of the region, highlighting its often unexpected connections to political radicalism, psychoanalytic philanthropy, and occult subcultures. It created opportunities for networking, both cross-regionally and locally (The Pavilion and Project Art Works; Camden Arts Centre, the Freud Museum, and the Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Trust, which has founding connections with surgeon and psychoanalyst Pailthorpe): ‘Developing partnerships locally and nationally, this exhibition has created further opportunities for audience experience learning’ [S10]. Associated events generated some surprising outcomes: after the supporting ‘Virus of Hate’ symposium the De La Warr Head of Exhibitions reflected that ‘the Anti-Social Behaviour and Hate Crime Co-ordinator from East Sussex Police […] contacted us afterwards to [say] that some of the information that she gained during the event would help to inform how they can work directly with Police Officers and Police Community Support Officers to tackle hate crime’ [S10]. The exhibition also increased audiences for the participating galleries: the Pavilion show attracted ‘the highest proportion of visitors […] visiting the Ground Floor Gallery in three years’, many coming to the venue for the ‘first time’; visitors included 226 school children, 246 students, and, via a Project Art Works event, 50 adults with complex support needs [S10]. Interest in the artists’ work has considerably grown since the exhibition: in 2020, it was, for instance, shown in a British Surrealism exhibition at Dulwich Picture Gallery.

Stimulating Cultural Tourism and the Regional Economy

Incorporating both exhibitions, the ‘Sussex Modernism’ initiative has generated new and tangible opportunities for collaboration and regional cultural strategy, and increased audiences for participating museums and galleries. 70% of those surveyed at the Sussex Modernism exhibition were ‘inspire[d]’ to visit Sussex: some spoke of wanting ‘to go to all the galleries in Sussex and learn more’ [S6b], while others were ‘Already planning our holiday to all the Sussex galleries’ [S6c]. In the summer of 2017 Ditchling Museum reported visitor figures since the exhibition being ‘on average 60% over the forecast’ for that time of year [S4]. Farleys noted: ‘The Sussex Modernism show had a very clear impact – roughly 9% more people came in that period’; it was also stated that some visitors first heard of the House through Sussex Modernism [S8].

The ‘Sussex Modern’ network emerged in response to this success. From a group of nine that were directly involved in supporting the initial exhibition and whose collections were freshly connected through Wolf’s curatorial research, it has expanded to become thirty-six partners and a much more significant advocate for the region and its heritage. At the exhibition a ‘constellation map’, produced by the network, was released, visualising and emphasising the proximity of the regional venues. As one steward reported: ‘that did go down really well, people didn’t realise they were so close, or they had heard of some of it […] but didn’t realise the other ones were there’ [S6d]. Wolf contributed to the interest in ‘connecting the dots’ on the map by offering an intellectual rationale for viewing the different collections together and by highlighting parts of collections that were less well-known, consequently encouraging new visits (‘visitors […] might not know that we have Surrealist objects in our collection and perhaps make a special outing to come here’ **[S9]**). Drawing attention to the work of neglected artists, she also suggested new points that might be added to the cultural map.

The cultural tourism prompted by the ‘thriving success’ of the Sussex Modernism initiative ensured ‘investment’ in ‘Sussex Modern’ in terms of finance, time, and infrastructure, including Arts Council funding to develop the ‘Sussex Modern’ brand [S1, S4]; ‘We were able to build on the exhibition by launching an audience development campaign […] which capitalised on the success of the exhibition’ [S2]. East Sussex County Council’s [text removed for publication] emphasised the ‘positive economic impact’ ‘Sussex Modern’ has had, which the Sussex Modernism exhibition ‘helped to spawn’:

‘The fact that the Sussex Modernism exhibition was the highest footfall for a Two Temple Place regional exhibition… the prestige of being at Two Temple Place, the fact it was a collaboration across East and West Sussex and Brighton and Hove…all these really caught people’s attention and they are factors which have undoubtedly contributed to its significant impact […] [T]he opening of the Sussex Modernism exhibition in February 2017 was a milestone moment for me in the delivery of the East Sussex Cultural Strategy because it said “look what we have and look what we can do” […] none of this would have happened without the exhibition at the heart of it.’ [S12].

Of the first exhibition, it was remarked that Wolf did not offer a ‘tired’ or ‘comfortable’ story of modernism in the county: ‘she injected radicalism and excitement and contemporary feel relevant to that story which has significantly bolstered the strength of the [‘Sussex Modern’] campaign going forward’ [S1]. The show was described as a ‘resounding success’ in raising ‘the profile and perceived value of culture amongst political stakeholders, particularly around perception of the county’ [S4]. Wolf continued to present a ‘Surprising Sussex’ [S7] in her second show, finding further ways to ‘highlight underrepresented histories of modernism in ways that resonate so significantly with contemporary political and social contexts’ [S10]. Raising visitor numbers, fostering collaborations, and shifting perceptions, the Sussex Modernism initiative continues to have a significant tangible impact on the cultural sector in the county.