Now over 80, Laetitia Yhap is something of an institution in Hastings and St Leonards. The opening of her recent exhibition, on 6 April at the De La Warr Pavilion, was crowded, maybe with some casual viewers, but also with her many friends and neighbours. Trying to get a word down as a mere writer proved difficult – one needed to interrupt a long procession of people anxious to congratulate her and exchange nuggets of wisdom, and indeed there was a great deal of hugging. 

It was a great atmosphere. Laetitia remarked that she had voluntarily hung all the paintings herself rather than leave it to any random curator. Not only that, but she pointed out that she spent days writing explanatory texts both large-scale, to accompany the exhibition, and online as a supplement, so we are unapologetic about quoting those extensively here. 

Yhap’s work is never on canvas. Having examined extensively the paintings of Old Masters, she writes: “I disliked the idea of ‘framing’ and the way it could corral images and tame them, as it were, so that they could take their place, subdued on a wall in a room or a gallery. I was thinking of gold antique historic frames on Impressionist paintings in drawing rooms or galleries. And I disliked canvas and the way its weave affected the brush stroke.”

These restrictions in mind, she goes on: “Each painting was a one off. I carpentered the shapes myself and there were further stages in priming the surfaces. It would often take a week or so to complete these constructions. It was a very physical business. but because it took so much time before I could begin to paint on each particular shape, I already knew my way around it intimately. The shape had to seem inevitable for what it held, so I could not afford to get it wrong. Perhaps they were a kind of thought balloon.” 

Moving round the dozen or so thought balloons in the first floor gallery at the De La Warr, it was useful to reflect on this. In fact every painting is steeped in the kind of inevitability she looks for; it’s impossible to imagine any of them in any other medium or shape. They are monumental, significant, and Yhap is extremely accomplished. “So much of the work of creation,” she writes, “is hidden from the onlooker. Transformation of what is seen requires gymnastics of the imagination. If it is successful in a painting, one has conjured a unique reality from the ether.” 

Victoria Kingham

Details of the exhibition at dlwp.com/exhibition/laetitia-yhap/. Available for download on the same site are her own writings and musings on her art work, which are carefully thought out and very personal. The exhibition runs till 27 May in the First Floor Gallery at the Pavilion. 

Sometimes artists get a bad press. They are occasionally depicted as narcissistic types obsessed with their own ideas and neurotic about reviews and, of course, sales. But the
Art Auction held by HIP in December proved all that to be utter nonsense. In fact, the generosity of local artists in their willingness to donate for free was quite staggering. The Auction raised more than £5k. A sum that is a considerable boost to the paper for 2022. A huge ‘thank you’ goes out to absolutely everyone involved.

Curiously, on the day itself, the omens were not good. In the afternoon a storm hit the town and brought such heavy rain and wind that many of us felt no one would brave such elements just for pretty pictures. (On top of that, 7 December was also the 80th anniversary of the Pearl Harbour air raid – not really relevant, but hardly an encouraging sign.) But, amazingly, the weather calmed by late afternoon and the people of Hastings came in search of artistic treasure in great numbers.

Kate and Richard in action

HIP would like to take this opportunity to thank a couple of individuals by name. Dave, the proprietor of ‘The Horse and Groom’ in Mercatoria, was an absolute star: he let us wander in and out of the back room in the days before the auction as we saw fit and really could not have been more helpful. Although at one point on the day of the auction, the pub had to bolt its door to keep the wind at bay. Carrying large paintings from car to pub in the afternoon risked the artwork being flung into the wild air. Another hero of the artistic hour was Richard Fryer, local writer, seafarer and brilliant furniture maker who also, it turned out, was a great auctioneer. He was ably assisted by the multi-talented Kate Tym who engaged the audience with wit and not a little good-humoured verbal prodding.

Pondering the paintwork

The range of art on show was amazing. The auction had everything, from the brilliant to the baffling or bizarre and all stations in between. There were all sorts of paintings from the small and intricate to the vast. There were numerous artists in this field, and among them were Oska Lappin, Katherine Reekie, Russell Baker, Ian Barraclough, James Mackinnon, Tom Banks, Daisy Clarke, Stewart Walton, Robin Holtom, Martin Bradshaw, Danny Mooney, Claudia de Grandi and many, many more. Photography included Ian O’Leary, John Coles, Alex Brattell, Alexandra Vacaroiu, Patricia Webb and Sonny Levitt. Print and mixed media was very lively, including works from Alan Rankle and Laetitia Yhap, Hazel Brook and Peter Quinell but also more pop-punky pieces from Carrie Warrior, Georgie Wheeler, Chris Milton and Jude Montague. Ben Eine’s street art came courtesy of Steph at ‘Stella Dore’ and many thanks to her for that. In what might be called the conceptual category we had the wonderfully intriguing Becky Beasley. Adrienne Hunter’s piece seemed to dynamically straddle drawing and painting. There was also a strong showing in ceramics, from Mudworks, Annabel Faraday, Bernard McGuigan, Liz Emtage and Jane Loftin. We even had a charming cartoon by the late, great Martin Honeysett. Local shops were also generous in donating prizes for the raffle, and Catriona Lafferty was heroic in jumping in, last-minute, to run it. 

In total, more than fifty artists contributed and apologies to those not mentioned due to lack of space. Thanks also to the unsung heroes who did the lugging in the rain and the fixing to the walls. Including Claire-Marie Moore and our own Fiona McGarry, Rod Webb, Kent Barker, Suzie McFie and Ben Cornwell. Overall, as they say in very silly circles, everyone was a winner. 

• See the full list of works for sale here

As everyone knows, the art and popular culture market is a fickle one. Often seeming irrational. Why, for example, is George Formby’s banjo-ukelele worth more than Noel Gallagher’s hand-written lyric book? Is ‘Wonderwall’ a lesser achievement than ‘I’m leaning on a Lamp-post?’ Who knows? Obviously, it is very hard to know what determines the value of things. Which is, of course, why auctions are so fascinating and indeed unpredictable. 

On the evening of December 7 this newspaper is holding an Art Auction, at the suitably chic ‘Cactus Hound’ in St Leonards, to raise funds to keep HIP alive. And maybe kicking. (Big thanks to the Cactus – which arguably has some of the best cocktails in St Leonards on Sea) Hastings and St Leonards are brimming with creatives and they have been incredibly generous in offering work for the event. As a result, the auction will feature an exceptionally diverse range of work. In addition to paintings, there will be prints, photo-graphs, drawings, ceramics and sculpture. The auction will have ‘guide prices’ set for each piece, but monetary outcomes are, inevitably, hard to call.

Some of the artists on show are well established names in the Hastings art world. Laetitia Yhap, for example – who has work in the Tate Collection – has a piece up for offer. Her artwork has now become identified with the town; it is figurative in approach, with Hastings fisherfolk and beach-life at its heart. Alan Rankle is another of the town’s leading artistic lights and he is also donating. John Cole is a local photographer who has produced iconic images of world figures, such as Mohammad Ali, and a figure of similar stature appears in the auction. Chris Milton has donated a print that highlights his gift for putting down a searing, and yet somehow witty, line. His piece ‘Pinocchio Pope’ has already generated interest.

Most of the artists on show have, at some point, been featured in HIP. Daisy Clarke and Tom Banks for example have been highlighted recently: both are intriguing painters whose reputations are definitely on the upward trajectory. Russell Baker, from Kino, is a Slade trained and renowned printmaker, and a wonderful painter.  Also on show will be other well established artists, such as Bernard McGuigan and Claudia de Grandi. Martin Bradshaw – who is currently on show at the Hastings Arts Forum – is also donating. There are many more who could be mentioned. Overall, it is an interestingly eclectic mix and it will be intriguing to see how the auction unfolds. It should be a fun evening.

The paper has always sought to support the local art scene, whether it be traditional graphic work, film festivals, rock bands, people’s operas, theatre or even poetry brothels. We all know that most artists are not exactly rolling in cash but, to be honest, the paper has been overwhelmed with the willingness of the bohemian community to donate. 

In many ways, the value of art is not just about the price of it. That would be crass. But, having said that, and putting all subtlety to one side for a moment, this auction may well offer up some smart buys to the discerning eye. 

“The impulse to make paintings precedes reason. An artist often needs to make work while waiting for a particular imperative to make itself felt.”
Laetitia Yhap

Having moved to Hastings in 1967 it took seven years before Laetitia Yhap found the theme and focus for what turned out to drive the next two decades or so of her creative practice.

One day in 1974 she crossed the road to go and sit for a while on the fishing beach without any artistic purpose but happened to have a pencil and an old brown envelope in her bag. She explains that she had never had any intention to become absorbed with the work of the fishing fleet, but through that first drawing with improvised materials she says that “In one heightened moment I experienced something like an awakening.”

On viewing the exhibition, I was beset with an overwhelming longing to see the paintings in the flesh. As ever, you always want what you can’t have, and whilst, of course, Hastings Museum have done a good thing by hosting this show online, it left me aching to be in a room surrounded by the works themselves.

Uncondescendingly charming, every custom shaped painting depicts an almost tableau-like scene playing out on Hastings beach. Yhap’s complex compositions cast The Stade as a stage and each one recreates the ‘theatre’ of the fishermen’s interwoven relationship with the sea. The artist says that it was the “the intricacy of their existence” which fascinated her. “These days there are not many activities that are as archetypal or a primal as this [commercial fishing] in this country.” she says. In many ways Yhap’s oeuvre documents an artisanal industry under threat from new technology and the move towards large scale trawling. There is a certain mournfulness and introspection seeping out of each figure in her paintings which not only bears testament to this, but also speaks of the sheer hard work and tenacity of the depicted men.

As well as featuring an essay by Yhap and photos of her work, the visitor can also view two films: The Catch and A Girl Ashore – Laetitia Yhap at 80 by Mark French. These films tell the story of how she became submerged in the working world of Hastings’ fishermen, what compelled her to want to celebrate this through painting and touchingly recounts how the fishing community welcomed her unconditionally.

This is great work that implicitly argues that Art should be put to the service of the local community and used to document change.

• To view this exhibition, you can visit the Hastings Museum & Art Gallery’s website www.hmag.org.uk/collections/myvitallife/ until 9th May 2021. Whilst the website provides a hub to the show and features two short films, the paintings are best viewed through the museum’s Facebook page here 

ERICA SMITH

There is so much going on in Hastings and St Leonards that sometimes I dream of moving to London for a quieter life.

16 years ago, I moved ‘Over From Brighton’, and I’ve watched the town change. Whilst each wave of incomers likes to think that they are bringing culture to a stony beach, they are just adding another layer to the history. I love stories of the pioneering creatives of the ’70s and ’80s – the barefoot saxophonist Min who played with the Jazz Caverners, Huggy Leaver who led the Teen Beats and somehow avoided death by overdose (unlike many of the Hastings punks), and Fiona Pitt-Kethley, the erotic poet who fled from St Leonards in 2002 for a warmer life in Spain.

In 1990, Jonathan Meades presented a TV series called In Search of Bohemia which celebrates the extraordinary character of our town – the unfinished architecture inhabited by artists like Mick and Trish Rooney, Laetitia Yhap and Angie Braven and Gus Cummins. You can find his praise song to Hastings on YouTube.

All these people contributed to our town, and continue to. They paint and write and sing and invent festivals and commemorate dead fishermen with drinking games and daft tournaments. Hastings is a town which has always made its own entertainment – rich veins of graffiti, illuminated bike rides and fancy-dress parties.

When I moved here, I felt privileged to be welcomed into ‘old Hastings’. Unlike Brighton, people of different ages and proclivities and experiences talked to me. But I realised that they didn’t always know each other. I set up an email list called Hastings Creative Media Community – now Hastings Creatives. It started with eight members and now there are nearly 1000. The website is soon to be re-vamped – with support from Hastings Borough Council. Real-life events are also being planned so the latest waves of creatives can start conversations in person, as well as on-line. 

Follow this link, sign up and join the discussion:
https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/HastingsCreatives/info

We hope you have enjoyed reading this article from Hastings Independent Press. The future of this volunteer led, non-profit publication would be far more secure with the aid of a small donation. It only takes a minute and we would be very grateful.

The sandstone walls of Undercliff House have, for the last few months, been adorned with scenes of Hastings and South London. They are large, delicate watercolours depicting scenes of glassy skies, transient weather conditions and distant activity seen through the window of a domestic interior.

This small and intimate display shows the early work of celebrated Hastings artist, Laetitia Yhap and marks the fiftieth anniversary of her arrival in Hastings. She had recently finished at London’s Slade School of Art and her move to Hastings didn’t immediately impact her painting. Gradually though, she was becoming immersed in Hastings, and by the late seventies she had found the subject she would come to focus on exclusively for the next twenty years – the fishing community of Hastings and the portion of their lives spent on the Stade. The paintings at Undercliff House are from this decade of transition.

Yhap and her then partner were both working as artists when they decided to look for a place on the coast. He was teaching at the Slade and she had been a student there. “There was a feeling that if you were an artist you had to be in London”, she tells me, “but we both needed to be by the sea for at least a portion of our time, he had grown up in East Anglia and, though I was born in London, I had also become used to having access to the sea. We still needed to be within easy reach of London for work but needed a place which felt removed enough for it be different … there was no point in being in Brighton, of course.”

In March, they spent a day driving along the south coast looking for somewhere they could see themselves settling and by the time they arrived in St Leonards it had started snowing. “We couldn’t even get out of the car,” Yhap tells me, “but as we drove along the front I felt it would be OK; the geography of the place and the contrasting architecture, and the fact it was so run down – I could tell there would be something here.”

On a more thorough recce she soon found the house in Old Town in which she still lives. “The view has barely changed at all but the town then bears no resemblance to now. It was impossible to buy a vegetable on the High Street and George Street still had traffic. I’d grown up with street markets. So I grew vegetables and we brought everything else with us, coffee, cheese – this went on for a long time.”

With her life still based in London, for the first few years she found herself making secret day trips to the town, “I’d walk about trying to absorb something or other, find out what this place was about just by being here, and then jump on the train back to London. It was my secret with myself and how the place started having an effect on me. It was a significant decision for me to turn my back on London, I didn’t like living this half-life and the thought of being in London to attend all the private views was unsatisfactory, so I finally decided to spend most of my time down here.”

The paintings on display in Undercliff House are from this transitional period, most are the large watercolours she had gained much respect for towards the end of her time at the Slade. “It felt like I never had a studio, just a window sill and so that became the view I painted – it provided a useful surface, things could be seen through it or things may land on it. I knew I wanted to bring figures back into my work – something as an art student I had felt was not acceptable, so working on a view from my window I could start to introduce small characters into my paintings by engaging them in activity in the distance.”

The last of these paintings shows the window pane broken and a large flock of birds circling above. The painting holds an enormous sense of release and freedom. “A chair had bashed into the window, it had been an accident, and I knew I had to paint it like that.”, she says. This was 1974.

Also in 1974 she found herself on the beach closest to her house watching the fishermen. She took out whatever paper she could find in her bag and started drawing. She would go back on an almost daily basis – eventually going to sea, getting her hands on the work itself and becoming an integrated part of life on the Stade in her own right. The paintings she produced over these subsequent years were displayed at the Stade Hall in 2015 and are in private and public collections internationally.