BEASTLY HALL: Hall Place & Gardens, Bexley, 2013

Beastly Hall marked the inaugural curatorial collaboration between Artwise and Hall Place that delivered three diverse contemporary exhibitions into the historic Tudor House by invitation of Caroline Worthington (Chief Executive of Bexley Heritage Trust). The initiative brought cutting edge contemporary art to a diverse audience in Bexley Heath and allowed for an interesting education and outreach programme.

Beastly Hall was curatorially inspired by and paid tribute to the magnificent topiary ‘Queen’s Beasts’, real and mythical creatures that were planted at Hall Place to mark the HM Queen’s Coronation in 1953 and still stand proud sixty years on. With curious parallels, the exhibition featured contemporary ‘creatures’ as imagined by internationally acclaimed artists along with subversive responses to the idea of ‘beasts’.