Polska by the Sea

11 - 26 April 2009

An installation of photographs at Eastbourne Station by award-winning photographer Lisa Barnard - plus text and interviews focusing on the lives, stories and reflections of Polish people living and working in Eastbourne and Sussex. The project has been developed with the support of community organisation Polskie Eastbourne and offers an opportunity for Polish people to tell their own stories, speak about their lives and describe how England looks through their eyes

In changing times, as the economic recession effects job opportunities and the pound becomes weaker, this exhibition celebrates the vibrant contribution made by Polish migrants to life in smalll town England.

Photographs by Lisa Barnard.  Text drawn from interviews with Poles living in Eastbourne by LLL's Artistic Director, Mark Hewitt

www.lisabarnard.co.uk / www.mchblank.co.uk

Lisa Barnard was born in 1967 and lives in Lewes. She completed a BA in Editorial Photography with First Class Honours in June 2005 at Brighton University. Her work is informed by member’s - both past and present - of The Institute of Psychoanalysis, London. Of particular interest are those practitioners who have explored psychoanalytic aesthetics. She has recently concluded a year long Photographic Residency at the Unicorn Theatre for Children. She continues to work on her own artistic practice, which is connected to both the fine art and editorial genres. Her work has been reviewed in The Daily Telegraph and The Observer. She receives regular photographic commissions, including portraiture, advertising,editorial and educational projects and is a visiting lecturer at universities in London and the south east. Her recent show, Virtual Iraq, won the Danny Wilson Memorial Award at Brighton Photo Biennial Fringe 2008.

Right: photograph of Lisa Barnard by Jol Grus, Eastbourne Station, 2009 »

The collection of 24 postcards created for Polska by the Sea are now available as an attractive boxed set.

The cards feature photographs by Lisa Barnard of domestic ephemera evoking - in a range of ways - the idiosyncracies and Polish roots of the interviewees that took part in the project.

The postcards are made to be used as postcards with the reverse side of each card having a space for an address and message of your own that can be sent to friends or family in the usual way. The reverse side also contains a snippet of text drawn from one of Mark Hewitt's interviews with Eastbourne Poles.

Right: postcard image by Lisa Barnard »»

Mark Hewitt is Artistic Director of Lewes Live Lit. He has contributed to a wide range of cross artform collaborations with visual artists, photographers, composers and others and frequently uses 'the interview' as a creative tool.

For Polska by the Sea, Mark interviewed a range of Polish people living and working in Eastbourne, mainly the current generation of young economic migrants that have come to Britain to find work and opportunities work but also older Poles that arrived as child refugees in the aftermath of World War II.

Right: photograph of Mark Hewitt by Jol Grus, Eastbourne Station, 2009 »

This project kindly supported by Southern. 

Financially supported by Awards for All Big Lottery Fund 

and East Sussex Arts Partnership.

With thanks to Polskie Eastbourne   www.polskieeastbourne.org.uk