Lewes exhibition reflects life changes and changing times

Running from Saturday, April 26-Sunday, May 4, it features paintings and drawings David J Taylor (Tuesday-Saturday, 11am-4pm; Sunday, 11am-3pm; closed Monday).

David said: “The concept of this exhibition was developed over the last few years. My wife had a severe stroke in 2020. After looking after her for the first three years at home, it became too much for me. She moved to a nursing home in Alfriston, a small idyllic village just over the hill from Seaford, in the Cuckmere Valley.

“The subject of the exhibition is an expression of emotions and experiences: the loss of freedom, the change of our lives. Previous to her stroke we would visit in Alfriston, a little café called Chestnut. Alas no longer there, opposite a picture gallery, also gone.

“I was fortunate to help restore the lions ship’s figurehead outside The Star Inn, with thanks to Reverend Frank Fox, a brilliant carver. Also with his help I restored two paintings, a hatchment, and the King George royal coat of arms, hanging in St Andrews church. Alfriston was part of our everyday lives.”

David added: “I was born in 1935. Sorry for all that took place afterwards, the empire, World War Two, Thatcher and Johnson. Maybe it was more black and white in this world.

“I left school aged 14 and became an apprentice, a silk screen printer on glass, a craft, not a fine art. By the time I was 18 years old, I was claimed by the army’s compulsory National Service for two years and posted to Germany or what was left of it.

“I was demobbed in 1955. Once free I decided to pursue my desires, the arts after a few feral years in the late 1950s, living in St Albans, Herts, and later, in London. In those years, I enjoyed walking into art schools, just drawing, or talking, or attending lectures. All free.

It was the beginning of the 1960s. By this time I’d married, and had a child, so I took on regular employment. My first post was at the National Gallery, London. Not as a conservator, but as a warder. That’s security today. It was low pay, odd hours, but bliss. All those paintings to view and to be paid for it. This was the beginning of my education in the history and development of painting. I realise how ignorant I was regarding the subject. They were wonderful years.

“I obtained a position at the Victoria & Albert Museum, from a warder to a craftsman. Again the experience just threw me deeper into the arts. I even met Jennie Lee, the arts minister at the time. I stayed at the V&A for two years. In that time I learnt how to display works of art, also how to pack and transport them.”