Lewes' Star Brewery Gallery is emerging as a key Sussex venue

SussexWorld

Star Brewery Gallery director Neeta Pedersen talks to Phil Hewitt/SussexWorld

Transcript

00:00 Good morning, my name is Phil Hewitt, Group Arts Editor for Sussex Newspapers, and it's

00:06 lovely to be speaking to Nita Pedersen, who is the Gallery Owner at the Star Brewery Gallery

00:11 in Lewes. And it's been a fabulous success story, hasn't it, since the pandemic. Just

00:16 remind me how the gallery started. You started in the really sort of dark days, didn't you?

00:21 It wasn't the best timing, really.

00:23 No, it wasn't. I took over the space in February 2020.

00:29 So just before everything shut down.

00:31 Just before. I was meant to have my opening show on the Friday when the first lockdown

00:36 happened on the Monday. But because I used to do websites, I still do websites for a

00:42 living, I could then take it online, the show online. So I spent the whole night building

00:49 this online gallery with the three artists that was going to be in the opening show,

00:53 which was Peter Mizzet, Tom Benjamin and Andrew Fidgett.

00:58 So on the Friday at 12 o'clock, we launched the online show and it was a really successful

01:03 show.

01:04 So you were able to do something during those horrible days of the lockdown then?

01:08 I was. Every single show that was cancelled in here, most of them had an online show.

01:15 And when I then could reopen the gallery, most of them came in to have their show in

01:19 here.

01:20 That's fantastically resourceful, isn't it? Because it meant that when you were actually

01:23 able to open, you had already built a certain momentum, hadn't you?

01:27 I had, yeah. Yeah, the gallery had gotten really known because it had been closed down

01:32 for quite a while before I took it over. I mean, it was working as a gallery, but I'm

01:36 not quite exactly sure what they were doing. But I managed to get it back up. So when we

01:43 did open, we did have a lot of visitors.

01:45 Definitely. And you've done very well since opening, haven't you, since opening properly.

01:50 What makes it a special gallery, do you think? What are its particular qualities?

01:54 Oh, there's so many. I mean, the gallery has a long history. It was initially established

02:01 as a gallery in the 80s, and it was a star gallery and then it has had different owners

02:05 over the years. So when I took it over, I intentionally renamed it, I named it the Starbury

02:13 Gallery. So it was sort of resonating with people from what it used to be, and I was

02:17 trying to get back that concept of what it used to be. So, because it was such a valuable

02:23 gallery for the community, for the artists, and it still is. And also the location of

02:29 it is near the High Street. It's in a beautiful old building that used to be a brewery and

02:34 it's surrounded by various workshops with creative people.

02:38 Absolutely. But what makes it good inside, a good space to enjoy and appreciate art?

02:44 Inside the building? Oh, the room is beautiful, the lighting is perfect, the floor has this

02:48 beautiful stone floor. It's very light, very good energy in here, very warm.

02:56 And you have a very good, very interesting programme, don't you? Lots of varied artists.

03:01 How do you find your artists? Well, a lot of people contact me and I look

03:07 at it and I try as much as I can to have a varied sort of, you know, varied shows throughout

03:14 the year. From like sculpture, painting, photography this year. I've got the college students coming

03:21 in from East Sussex College in Lewes. I did the Artwave shows, which was very successful

03:27 last year. We did a show based on rivers. And in October of the previous year, we did

03:34 one based on trees, which was a group show with 17 different artists.

03:38 So, variety is important. Yeah, absolutely.

03:40 And how many shows do you do a year? Oh, well, again, it varies a little bit with

03:47 the length of the shows, but probably 10, 15.

03:51 And important too is the fact that you are an artist, aren't you? Do you get to show

03:56 your own work very often? I am, I am. And I am actually putting on a

04:00 shelf with my new works. Well, a bit of new and old stuff, but mainly new stuff in October.

04:07 Fantastic. Well, congratulations on all you've achieved, despite the trickiest, stickiest

04:13 of starts. You've done brilliantly. Lovely to speak to you. Thank you.

04:17 Thank you. Thank you, Phil.

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