When you visit us again from 20 May, you'll be able to enjoy a selection of artworks from local Hastings resident, Laetitia Yhap.
Laetitia studied at Camberwell College of Arts and the Slade School of Fine Art, both in London. Her work is in the permanent collection of the Tate Gallery.
This week, Laetitia spent some time hanging some striking pieces on our red walls. Here are a couple of snaps from the cinema to give you a flavour of what you can see when you come along to see a film with us again:
Most recently, Laetitia created an unopened exhibition at Hastings Museum & Art Gallery. Covid restrictions meant that this 80th Birthday retrospective of her work has been unable to be seen in person. (You will be able to see a selection of drawings from her archive displayed in the upper gallery of the museum when it is able to reopen.)
See a film made about Laetitia by filmmaker Mark French:
About the display at the cinema
Laetitia has shared some information about the paintings on display at the Electric Palace:
Left Hand side wall: The Challenge - Girls & Boys 1996 (after Degas: The Young Spartans Exercising circa 1860.)
"The painting hangs in the National Gallery in London and I used to visit it often. It was found unfinished in Degas’ studio after his death - he worked on it over a period of 20 years.
I split the action to create a diptych and replaced the landscape of the original with a Hastings stone wall."
Right Hand side wall: Mother & Baby & young man: Transcription from Giorgione (La Tempesta circa 1508)
"The original small painting sets the naked mother and baby and the young man in woodland, oddly separated, with a storm brewing. I felt I could best present this mystery by creating a diptych of different sizes and shapes.
In the original painting the beautiful landscape is as important as the figures, both in terms of scale and mood, but I have chosen to ignore this.
And in this particular hanging in the Electric Palace, the young man has found himself even more separated than usual!"
Left Hand Wall centre: The Millstone 1996-97 diptych after Dürer’s master engraving Melencolia 1514
"The original, from which I drew inspiration, is a large print which was in wide circulation at the time. It depicts one of the four temperaments, which, it was thought, determines one’s personality and is crammed full of arcane references and symbolic objects. I selected a few and gave myself the option of interpreting the animal represented, in one piece as a dog and in the other as a cat."
"The Exhibition ‘My Vital Life Laetitia Yhap at 80’ ran from January until May at Hastings Museum & Gallery. It received no visitors as the museum was closed due to the pandemic. The works hanging on the walls were from the period 1974-1995 and the subject matter was a cycle of paintings which depict the life of the Fishing Industry here on the Stade in Hastings."
"The pieces on show here were made after this period in my painting life. I was looking back at some of the masterpieces in the western canon of figurative art which had intrigued and affected me deeply. They are an acknowledgment or a kind of homage."
We hope you enjoy the paintings when you can visit us again soon!
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