Sea Like a Mirror
Sea Like a Mirror, a major touring programme commissioned to mark the 200th anniversary of the Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI), will tour to six lifeboat station towns across England throughout May and June this year. Opening in Whitstable over the May bank holiday weekend (2-5 May) the work will then tour to Cromer (15-18 May), Barrow-in-Furness (22-25 May), Weston-super-Mare (5-8 June), Cleethorpes (12-15 June) before returning to North Kent’s Gravesend for its final dates (21-22 June).
Sea Like a Mirror features new works honouring the profound legacy of the RNLI’s life-saving work and the special status its volunteer crews occupy in the collective consciousness of our island nation. At the heart of the programme is a newly commissioned artwork, White Horses, by Ivan Morison, from the collaborative practice of Heather Peak and Ivan Morison. Produced
through a series of visits to lifeboat stations and seaside towns around the coastline, and in close collaboration with those who hold a deep connection to the water, including oyster fishers, windfarm technicians, wild swimmers, the work explores the sea’s innate duality as a place of wonder and peril, and the myriad roles it plays for coastal communities.
This travelling work, housed within a unique, custom-made sculptural tent will be installed on the seafront, immersing audiences in the stories of RNLI crew and local people from around our coastline. Within this structure, Ivan’s new work, White Horses, will be screened using 16mm projection and accompanied by live music from local musicians, presenting a multifaceted portrait of the sea and the nation’s coastal towns, bringing together six diverse locations, each linked by the lifeboat station at the centre of their community.
In each setting, White Horses will be accompanied by a series of commissions by local artists, made in collaboration with the area’s community. In dialogue with Ivan’s central artwork, these local projects will open conversations on wellbeing, history, the changing landscapes and identities of seaside towns, the spiritual role the water holds for communities, and the differing relationships to the sea in these diverse coastal settings.
The local commissions include:
Whitstable and Gravesend
Cherelle Sappleton & Tom Morris’ Still Waters takes inspiration from water as a source and site of relaxation, to create an immersive sound work co-created with a group of 13 young people from Northfleet Technology College. The work invites audiences into a moment of calm, while also opening up reflection on the different associations people have with water.
Jas Dhillion’s workshop and performative ritual, Words on the Wind, explores our relationship to the sea and ideas of safety and connection in our physical, emotional and spiritual worlds. Through the art of conversation, communion, letter writing, and ceremony, words are woven into the natural elements of water, wind and fire, leaving no trace but the shared memory of the moment.
Cromer
For The Edge of the Land, artist and crew member on Sheringham Lifeboat, Kate Munro, has been working with children to explore themes of the sea and local maritime culture through research and interviews with local people. The children have created a series of artworks inspired by the place they live and the notion of rescue.
In a collaborative process, dance and theatre artist Neil Paris has been working with children from Sidestrand Hall School to create a short piece of dance theatre inspired by the RNLI’s 200-year anniversary. SOS: Superheroes of the Sea will incorporate drama, movement and music devised and composed by the young people themselves.
Barrow-in-Furness
Artist John Hall will work with Sacred Heart Catholic Primary School pupils to explore Barrow’s shipbuilding history for Tin Ships. They’ll design tin ships using recycled materials, researching shipbuilding before crafting their own fleet. The project culminates in an exhibition, celebrating Barrow’s coastal heritage and its deep connection to the sea.
Maddi Nicholson’s Above and Beyond placards celebrate Peggy Braithwaite, the UK’s first female principal lighthouse keeper, and the work of the RNLI. Peggy supported lifeboat crews, raised funds, and maintained South Walney Lighthouse. Honored with an MBE in 1984, she retired in 1994. The works recognise her as an unsung heroine of the area.
Working alongside Maddi Nicholson, Rachel Capovila, a textile and film artist, will oversee a participatory craft project in memory of Peggy Braithwaite. Working with the local Ladies Lifeboat Guild and a range of Barrow knitting groups, Rachel will galvanise Barrow’s knitters to make woollen hats to a standard pattern. The hats will be displayed and offered for sale to the public with all profits being donated to the Barrow RNLI lifeboat station.
Weston-super-Mare
White Horses will be presented alongside Promenade, a weekender event which explores place, environment and the natural world through multidisciplinary contemporary arts and socially engaged practice. The weekender will include five new early career micro-commissions for artists in the area, aged 18-30, as well as a 16mm film commission, coastal poetry, live music, performance, and site-specific artworks along the Promenade.
Cleethorpes
Lynsey Powels Shifting Sands will invite young people to explore the changing faces of the Cleethorpes’ sandscape through the ravages of weather and the reclamation of nature. Through a series of works the group will create a new SandArt sculpture on Cleethorpes Beach.
Beccy Owen’s We Are the Weather is an improvised sound performance using music-making which takes wildness, resilience, changeable weather and tides as inspiration. The work is created and performed by local children and young people capturing their ideas surrounding wildness, weather, mental health and wellbeing.
Credit
Sea Like a Mirror is a partnership project led by Cement Fields, with Art Gene, Norfolk & Norwich Festival, North East Lincolnshire Council & East Marsh United, and Super Culture. Presented in Gravesend with Estuary Festival. Supported with public funding from Arts Council England. With thanks to the Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI).
Quotes
Jon Davis, Cement Fields Director, said, “Cement Fields is delighted to be working with the RNLI and our commissioning partners Art Gene, Norfolk & Norwich Festival, North East Lincolnshire Council & East Marsh United, and Super Culture, to connect six diverse coastal communities and landscapes. The RNLI’s 200th anniversary is the perfect moment to explore what the sea means to us, using this much-loved institution as a mirror to reflect on our national identity. Ivan Morison will bring his unique ability to connect people, creating a communal and architectural intervention which disrupts our everyday lives enabling us to see our surroundings afresh and consider the civic institutions and social ties that bind us together.”
Artist Ivan Morison said, “When I began this wintertime survey of the coast, I was looking for storms, and people who face that storm, people who have found a place in the service of the sea. I have met fishermen of lobsters and crab, farmers of oysters, I have seen where we build our nation’s nuclear submarines, and understood the changing economies of these coastal towns, I have been out to wind farms and watched blade technicians at work, I have darted between huge tankers with a sixth-generation skipper on his tug, and I have swam with those that swim and been saved by those that save.
Yes I have found waves, sometimes there have been storms, but more than that I think I have found a changing but thriving coast populated by people with a sparkle in their eyes, doing remarkable things with an understated competence, and a lightness and joy. It’s this everyday preparedness, the ability to perform in extreme conditions, that I think I am looking for, and that perhaps the final work may illustrate. This is not a comprehensive survey, just an impression, the film an evocation of the spirit of these places and people.”
Charlie Rustem, RNLI Fundraising and Partnership Lead, said, “The RNLI is delighted to be part of this project, celebrating the sea and the lifesaving work of the RNLI. We are excited to work with Ivan and the partners of this collaboration to share Sea Like a Mirror with communities in 2025, especially at a time when the RNLI has been reflecting on its own history as part of our 200th anniversary celebrations.”