Feline Groovy Exhibition in Brighton

Gorgeous art at a gallery right beside the sea

An exhibition all about cats!

I currently have three pieces of art in the exhibition, 'Feline Groovy: An Exhibition of Cats' in Brighton, at the lovely gallery, Atelier Beside The Sea, which is in the Kings Road arches right on the seafront. The gallery itself has such a great variety of really gorgeous art in all different mediums, and this exhibition is no different. There is textile art, sculpture, painting, drawing and more, all celebrating the gorgeous little monsters that cats are. 

My cat portraits in the exhibition

All three of my artworks are textile art, which I made using free motion embroidery (one of my favourite things!), and various vintage textiles and lace. Two of my pieces in the exhibition are portraits of one of my gorgeous boys, Sweet Pea. He was the kind of gentle but boisterous tabby cat who was always happy to cuddle, no matter what he was doing. I intend to make a portrait of his brother next, and am currently experimenting with different materials to capture the depth of dark brown of his fur, as velvet isn't working.
The third piece is a portrait of a gorgeous cat I met at Oxfordshire Animal Sanctuary when I went cat cuddling a couple of years ago (yes it's a thing and I recommend it - you literally spend an hour cuddling their cats!) - he was so friendly and cuddly and ended up napping on me for some time! They're an amazing sanctuary, you can find out more about them here: https://oxfordshireanimalsanctuary.org.uk/. 

It's such a lovely theme for an exhibition, and to imagine the stories behind some of the  cats on display.

Inspiring work by Brighton artists

I was really excited to see work by Julie French (https://www.juliefrenchtextiles.com/), her beautiful embroidered fox piece in particular, which was on show at the gallery when I dropped off my work before Feline Groovy opened. I was lucky enough to attend a talk by Julie a couple of years ago when she told the story of the fox, so it was pretty magical to see the real thing in person, especially when I wasn't expecting it! She captures his personality and feelings so well.

I was also really lucky to catch the Personae exhibition by Dan and Serg (https://www.danandserg.com/) while I was there - their work was incredible and inspired me to paint figures again - something I plan to do while hibernating this winter. The creativity and skill on show across both of their work, in the photography, painting, 3D work and drawing, and the way it was presented almost like walking into a religious crypt, was so immersive, and it was lovely to chat to both of them about their inspiration and how they work. 

The gallery is just a couple of doors down from The Open Studios which is always worth a visit when you're in the area too. They have work by several artists on display, including Nate Cordery (https://www.natecorderyartist.com/), who paints the most beautiful sunsets and seascapes - I would love to have one of his paintings in every room of my house!

The exhibition runs from 18th September to 25th November 2026, so there's still plenty of time to catch it! They also have a lot of the work online at their website: https://atelierbrighton.co.uk/