Hauser & Wirth Somerset

Work No. 1086, EVERTHING IS GOING TO BE ALRIGHT, 2011 - Martin Creed

For unnerved Londoners who make the two-hour journey to the historic town of Bruton from the capital, where white walls and polished concrete floors maketh a contemporary art gallery, Martin Creed’s Work No. 1086 welcomes them into the farm yard surroundings of Hauser & Wirth’s new Somerset outpost with the neon words, EVERYTHING IS GOING TO BE ALRIGHT. Whether you need the reassurance or simply appreciate the humour, visitors to Hauser & Wirth Somerset need not fret. There are no cattle grids to get your Louboutin heels stuck in and the paved paths around the green verges will avoid any soggy suede soles. As refreshing as the country air, Hauser & Wirth Somerset is not to be mistaken for a gallery exclusively catering for London-centrics on the weekends. While Bruton may seem a little out of place on Hauser & Wirth’s roster of international outposts in London, New York, Zurich and soon-to-be Los Angeles, there is more than meets the eye to this rural enterprise.

Hauser & Wirth is an influential player in the contemporary art world, which represents a collection of major league international artists and the estates of late modern masters. Iwan and Manuela Wirth are the successful power couple behind the commercial gallery and after moving to the UK from Switzerland in 2005, they subsequently discovered Somerset and the Dursdale Farm estate on the outskirts of Bruton. 

Untitled, 2008 - Subodh Gupta

Dursdale was a working farm for more than a thousand years and its history spans from the medieval and aristocratic through to the cinematic, serving as the location for Lasse Hallström’s 2000 film, Chocolat. After extensive local consultations, works began on restoring the dilapidated barns, stables, outhouses and neo-Gothic Grade II-listed farmhouse into a commercial gallery, art centre and restaurant across several buildings, all conceived by Paris architects Laplace and built by local firm Benjamin + Beauchamp.

Large Lamp I, 2011 - Thomas Houseago

Spider, 1994 - Louise Bourgeois 

The result is a beautifully executed setting where contemporary art and lifestyle meet through a middle-of-nowehere guise that is adventurous as it is familiar. Familiar, because there is arguably an air of the lifestyle destination that roving middle classes have come to relish of late. It also follows the growing trend of displacing contemporary art into alternative environments. This formula is nothing new. Works by the world’s leading artists can be found in isolated sculpture parks or converted factories and warehouses from Yorkshire and Upstate New York to islands off mainland Japan, respectively. Gagosian Gallery’s niche space in a converted hangar at Paris’s Le Bourget airport has been attracting visitors since 2012. The concept may be de rigeur, however the Wirth’s objectives in Somerset are distinct and faithful to the local community. This is reflected in the appointment of Alice Workman, director of Hauser & Wirth Somerset, who hails from Roche Court’s New Art Centre in Salisbury and Southampton City Art Gallery in the South West. Workman therefore understands the subject of art accessibility outside of the M25. The surrounding cities of Bristol, Exeter and Southampton simply cannot compete with the cultural saturation that London so easily attracts. Somerset County has also endured severe cuts to its arts funding and suffered a devastating flooding crisis last Winter. Far from being a vanity project, Hauser & Wirth Somerset is a cultural and economic lifeline for this area of South West England. Business is after all what commercial galleries excel at. Provincial attitudes are alien in a globally nomadic twenty-first century - the new gallery will introduce international art to the region in as much as introducing the region to international artists who will exhibit or take up artist residencies at the new space.

Ship of Fools, Ship Adrift, 2009-2010 - Paul McCarthy

The launch of Hauser &a Wirth Somerset features several large-scale outdoor installations by Paul McCarthy, Thomas Houseago, Louise Bourgeois and Anri Sala – statement works that create an extraordinary juxtaposition amongst the agricultural landscape. Piet Oudolf - garden designer behind major public commissions including the High Line in Manhattan, New York, Chicago’s Millennium Park and the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park on the site of the London 2012 Olympic Games – also contributes with a sinuous garden design over a 1.5 acre meadow that will open to the public on 14th September.

detail - untitled: stackedchairs, 2014 - Phyllida Barlow

British sculptor Phyllida Barlow inaugurates the gallery’s exhibition programme with an ambitious new body of work, titled GIG. Four galleries house the artist’s sculptural forms in her inimitable style of organized chaos and liberation from any concern for health and safety – in the best possible way.

untitled: postscorral, 2014 - Phyllida Barlow

Following Barlow’s colossal commission dock in Tate Britain’s Duveen Galleries, GIG comprises of several works that were created in response to the architecture and surrounding landscape. The network of these spaces – a Piggery, Pigsty and Threshing Barn – maintain their original beams and features, and include one positively white cube space – a nod to the gallery’s distant Mayfair sibling. 

untitled: grinder, 2014 - Phyllida Barlow

The installation, untitled: postscorral, showcases a series of supersized upturned matchsticks in Barlow’s signature materials of timber, cement, scrim and wire netting. Visitors circumvent the edges of the space and encouter other gravity-defying works on the walls and ceilings. untitled: grinder is an energetic sculpture that seemingly ploughs through the walls of the Pigsty with its static cogs or fluting, each candy-striped in a multi-coloured palette of pinks and yellows. A free-standing horseshoe-shaped sculpture neighbours the space with its apertures running from top to toe along its edge. The Threshing Barn displays an explosion of textural pompoms suspended from a frame that mirrors the barn’s joists at different heights. These piñata-esque creations made from colourful fabric and paper are attached by cord whose ends hang in touching distance to the ground, tempting visitors to unravel its ties and release the pompoms from the air. They surround a stage, untitled: pianoframeandcover, with abstract representations of the work’s namesake that roots Barlow’s GIG in a visual cacophony of colour, form and scale.

untitled: holder, 2014 - Phyllida Barlow

untitled:GIG, 2014 - Phyllida Barlow

Charm is not often used to describe the clinical spaces of contemporary art galleries, however Hauser & Wirth Somerset has it in bucketloads – cue Subodh Gupta’s supersize replica – from architectural preservation and sympathetic restoration, to the bespoke canvas smocks worn by the invigilators and the exposed kitchen displaying farm-to-fork produce in the Roth Bar & Grill. The lifestyle elements of the gallery complex include the walking trails through Dursdale Farm up to the impressive sixteenth-century Dovecote that looks down upon Bruton and the vales beyond. 

The on-site restaurant and bar, operated by award-winning local hotelier and restaurateur Catherine Butler of At the Chapel in Bruton, is a dynamic curation of gastronomy and contemporary art. Dieter Roth’s son and grandson, Björn and Oddur Roth, have designed the former cowshed into a visual feast for informal dining that serves breakfast through to dinner. Hauser & Wirth manage the late artist’s estate and continue a collaborative relationship with the Roth family. 

An eclectic array of salvaged materials and objects from reclamation yards from the surrounding area of Bruton echoes Dieter Roth’s own aesthetic during his lifetime. The variety of materials, textures and layers make for a unique sensory experience when paired with the hearty, seasonal menu that is sourced from the estate itself, local farmers, gamekeepers and gardeners. 

The dining room is decorated with works from Hauser & Wirth’s entire artistic family alongside pieces from the private collection of Iwan and Manuela Wirth. The unpretentious lunch menu offers a selection of chicken, lamb and beef accompanied with a generous selection of green leaves, edible flowers and vegetables du jour chosen by the chef. The monumental bar is well stocked and will make barmen from any capital jealous of the vibrant energy that has been achieved here.

In its opening week, Hauser & Wirth Somerset is already a fine-tuned cultural centre with an exceptional level of customer service that can be found wanting in many already established institutions. Its balance between art, community, land and lifestyle also guarantees its attraction to non-traditional art audiences in the South West of England with a burgeoning educational agenda and an unprecedented programme of exhibitions by international artists to come. Visitors can judge for themselves whether Creed’s prediction that EVERYTHING IS GOING TO BE ALRIGHT is a modest understatement of an ambitious gallery that is unleashing contemporary art beyond the white cube metropolis.

Hauser & Wirth Somerset is open to the public six days a week. GIG by Phyllida Barlow runs to 2nd November and Oudolf Field by Piet Oudolf launches on 14th September.

Visit Hauser & Wirth Somerset for travel information, details on talks and learning events as well as reservation details for Roth Bar & Grill.

Hauser & Wirth Somerset

Tues – Sun 10am – 5pm (10am – 4pm during Winter)

Dursdale Farm

Dropping Lane

Bruton

Somerset

BA10 0NL

Exhibition images - © 2014 Hauser & Wirth
Roth Bar & Grill kitchen images - Misato Tachibana @mtomatot

Day Tripping: South Coast

Last week I explored the sights and sounds of East Sussex and with time still left in ol’ Summer’s clock I thought I would share a few photographs from my day trip that spanned from Bexhill on Sea to Romney Marsh in Kent with a few surprises in between.

Starting the day at The Pelican Diner on Hasting’s East Parade was tough – tough on my taste buds that wanted to try absolutely everything on the menu. 

Huck Finn pancakes - The Pelican Diner, Hastings

I always find eating out for breakfast a real problem. The English have just about mastered brunch, however compared to our comrades both on the Continent and across the Atlantic, I feel breakfast still has a ways to go. The Pelican Diner is an exception – for menu fantasists, the tributes to American classics match up with what arrives on the plate, and what was on the plate was a slice of US of A heaven à la Huck Finn: fluffy blueberry pancakes, crispy bacon and proper maple syrup – yee-yum! Best seats in the house are on the light-filled first floor looking out onto The Stade and sea with local contemporary art decorating the walls. 

Walk off breakfast exploring the independent and eccentric shops in Hastings Old Town. The High Street is a charming parade of design and home interior boutiques, finely curated to their individual tastes. Be sure to visit A. G. Hendy & Co. Home Store for on-trend understated traditional lux living for home and kitchen as well as Made In Hastings across the road, for contemporary artisanal gifts and products.

Hastings’ latest cultural addition is the Jerwood Gallery. The black tile-clad white space opened in 2012, neighbouring the native black wooden net huts that are still used by local fisherman. Jerwood Gallery hosts seasonal exhibitions as well as a permanent collection of modern art. Currently on show are paintings by Jeffery Camp and etchings by the Chapman Brothers (Game of Corpses, August 2013).

Following the coastline Westwards, the De La Warr Pavilion is a national modernist landmark. Framed by Bexhill on Sea’s wide promenades along the sea front, its clean, cream lines houses a dynamic programme of exhibitions and events all year round.

The Universal Addressability of Dumb Things is curated by Turner Prize-winning artist Mark Leckey and includes a selection of historical and contemporary works of art, artefacts, technology and objects presented in specially designed environments that explore the connections past, present and future between this international collection. 

The Universal Addressability of Dumb Things curated by Mark Leckey

An outdoor installation of Exposure Sculptures by Matt Calderwood are also on display on the pavilion’s roof terrace.

Exposure Sculptures by Matt Calderwood

Ice cream by the sea is default whatever the weather - Di Paolo’s Café is a few minutes walk along the Marina from the De La Warr and offers genuine homemade Italian ice cream with a variety of delicious flavours to boot.

 

Through the picturesque harbour town of Rye - which is worthy of a return visit on another day for its preserved Tudor and Georgian architecture – lies the nature reserve of Dungeness in the county of Kent, east of Hastings. As the sun began to set, this leg of the trip was unexpected - the extent of this special detour only became clear through the shingled landscape that is overshadowed by Dungeness nuclear power plant.

The approach to the headland is unassuming along Dungeness Road until it nears the shore and the impressive Jurassic-esque terrain engulfs your field of vision. I would have never believed such a landscape existed in Britain - it is a peculiar corner of the land, officially classified as a desert. The wildlife and vegetation that lives and survives in such a bleak environment is equally remarkable, warranting the status as an important site for international conservation. 

As I had learned throughout my day along this stretch of coast, there is chic to be had in the rough. Small wooden cottages with their handmade ‘private’ signposts and security chains are scattered along the gravelled road that nears both power plant and The Britannia Inn pub - a when-in-Dungeness must, serving mighty fish and chips. 

The cottages that haphazardly sit along this landscape are uniform in their aesthetic – black matte finish is de rigeur and may have been inspired by the most famous dwelling in the village, Prospect Cottage. The former residence of English film director and Slade alumnus, Derek Jarman is a destination in itself – on one side of its exterior reads in raised lettering the poem, The Sunne Rising by John Donne. The front garden, and I use that term loosely, comprises of pebble and drift wood formations, scrap metal and a host of extraordinary plants that thrive on the peninsula. Jarman’s aesthetic has expanded to the other properties – some have retained their old railway coach features while others have redesigned their sought after residences into über chic bungalows with glass sides and even a shiny vintage airstream addition.

The Britannia Inn, Dungeness

Think Montauk compounds in America’s Hamptons, minimal Danish design and a retiring air of exclusivity and you’ll only be half way to understanding and appreciating the beauty of this area. As a lover of all things symmetrical, even I was taken by its charm and the uncomfortable sense of scale between the colossal nuclear power plant, the towering lighthouses and the lilliputian cottages in comparison. But I guess that is precisely what makes them so attractive as a refuge from the brutal outside world, in every sense of the word. 

As it got darker, adding more drama to the already dramatic, barren scape, I would have not wanted to visit at any other time. At the farthest end of the village I spied a highly designed compound with a series of cast iron sculptures in its garden I believed to be by Antony Gormley – my investigation to find out more about this exclusive enclave and its creative occupants begins, as does the countdown to my return to the South Coast…

Thank you again to @djbrass and the most distinguished whippet in the land, Finn, for such an eccentric itinerary! 

Jeffery Camp: The Way To Beachy Head and the Chapman Brothers' Exquisite Corpse exhibitions run to 2nd October 2013 - visit Jerwood Gallery for visitor information. 

The Universal Addressability of Dumb Things curated by Mark Leckey runs to 29th October 2013. Exposure by Matt Calderwood is on display until February 2014 -  visit De La Warr Pavilion for further details.