Brighton Museum & Art Gallery’s 20th Century collection traces the main developments in art and design from Art Nouveau, through Modernism and Surrealism, to Postmodernism and the contemporary.
The fine art collection is particular strong in early 20th century British art including works by Camden Town Group artists such as Walter Sickert, Robert Bevan, Harold Gilman and Charles Ginner. It features works by Vanessa Bell, Paul Nash, Graham Sutherland, Jacob Epstein, Eric Gill and Stanley Spencer and holds one of the finest public collections of Glyn Philpot works. From the post war period it has an outstanding collection of Post Abstract Expressionist paintings by Frank Stella, Larry Poons and Jules Olitski.
Thanks to the Contemporary Art Society Collections Fund the museum’s contemporary collection was significantly improved with the acquisition of two 16mm films by Ben Rivers (co-acquired with Bristol Museums). Ah, Liberty! and Origins of the Species (both 2008) were the first artists’ moving image works to enter the collection in 2015. They resonate beautifully with the city’s experimental film-making history and bring a contemporary perspective to bear on the more traditional portraits and landscape paintings.