Bexhill Art Weekender
A special weekend returns for 2026: a Town-Wide Celebration of Art, Performance, Film and Community
Bexhill Art Weekender returns on Saturday 15 and Sunday 16 August 2026, featuring artists’ open studios, drop-in workshops, a Bexhill Day concert, experimental music experiences, exhibitions, film screenings, ceramic sales and a celebration of sculpture and 3D art. For a weekend, Bexhill-on-Sea will be transformed into a vibrant, town-wide celebration of contemporary art, performance, music and creativity.
The Weekender brings together artists, cultural organisations, community groups and independent businesses to present a programme of exhibitions, performances, screenings, workshops, talks and open studios. Entirely free to attend, the festival invites residents and visitors to discover Bexhill’s rich cultural ecology, and to experience the town as a place of collective imagination.
Bringing together cultural institutions, artist-focused organisations, community groups, heritage organisations, youth initiatives and independent businesses, the festival offers a snapshot of a cultural infrastructure that is far greater than the sum of its parts. In doing so, it reveals part of Bexhill’s emerging plan and its UK ‘Town of Culture’ ambition: the town’s greatest cultural asset is its capacity for collaboration and continuing cultural evolution.
THE EXHIBITIONS
Alongside their Summer exhibitions programme, Tawfik Naas’ Manifestations for an Eternal Spring and Annie Whiles’ Door Way Guardians, Flatland Projects will present CEREMONIA, an evening of performances celebrating the radical potential of the analogue in a digital age. Bringing together experimental music, movement and collective gathering, the programme features Bionic Step by Canadian-British artist Nina Davies (whose work centres around dance and popular culture) and Ed Baxter’s Statue of Liberty ‘anti-fascist’ big band that offers collective, inclusive, diverse improvisatory performance.
The De La Warr Pavilion, in partnership with artist collective ZEROH, will present MASS, a one-day celebration of sculpture and 3D art, bringing together local and regional artists. Other highlights include a sunset screening of E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, the Revolver Record Fair in the auditorium, the launch of new collaborative projects with young people from Bexhill, and the Pavilion’s summer exhibition (reviewed in our last issue).
Common Clay opens its studios for exhibitions, a ceramic sale and Queer Clay Club by resident artists Nick Kidd and Camara Pinnock, whilst hosting a round-table discussion exploring class, making and access to ceramic practice. The weekend will also see artist Agata Bogacka invite artists and residents to take part in a Harvest Procession, a playful and participatory parade of handmade bread sculptures through the town.
Elsewhere, Do Your Ideas presents an exhibition by Anna Maria Nabirye, Letter Press Works, to accompany her residency at Written In Print Imprenta, a new letterpress print studio in Bexhill.
Bexhill Museum presents Sovereign Shoals with artists Yasmin Ornsby and Mary Hooper (curator of the fishermen’s exhibition at Hastings Contemporary), a new project developed with members of the Hastings Fishermen’s Protection Society.
Bexhill Heritage joins the programme with a free Bexhill Day concert featuring live performances from local music and theatre groups, celebrating the town’s rich cultural traditions and civic life. Meanwhile, Living Communities will present Run to Chase Your Dreams, a series of creative drop-in workshops for all ages, inviting participants to make, create and imagine together through accessible activities designed to encourage participation, connection and aspiration. Visitors will also discover, throughout the weekend, exhibitions and activities presented by Bexhill Artrium, Love Art By Sea, Living Communities, Heart of Sidley Community Association, RePublic, Peter Marlow Foundation, The Refugee Buddy Project, Talent Accelerator and many others, alongside open studios at Beeching Road Studios and across the town.
Through collaboration and collective participation, the Weekender seeks to tell new civic stories about the town, celebrating Bexhill as a place of quiet but continual cultural revolution that uses the power of culture to connect communities.
Ben Urban, Director of Flatland Projects and Chair of Bexhill Cultural Network, said: “One of the most powerful lessons from our bid to become the 2028 UK Town of Culture has been discovering just how deeply culture is woven into Bexhill’s sense of itself. There is an enduring futurism here, a feeling that the town is always in the process of becoming.”
Bexhill Art Weekender 2026 Saturday 15 – Sunday 16 August 2026 Free admission Full programme and information: bexhillartweekender.com. Social Media: @bexhillartweekender
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