Today, Cement Fields with Art Gene, Norfolk & Norwich Festival, Create North East Lincolnshire working with East Marsh United, and Super Culture announce Sea Like a Mirror, a major touring artwork commissioned to mark the 200th anniversary of the Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI) that will tour to six lifeboat station towns across England next year.
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, exploring the sea’s innate duality as a place of wonder and peril, and the myriad roles it plays for coastal communities.
Combining sculpture, 16mm film and music, this travelling work will be immersed in the stories and experiences of RNLI crew and local people with a deep connection to the water. White Horses presents 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.
Produced through a series of visits to lifeboat stations and seaside towns around the coastline – Whitstable, Cromer, Barrow-in-Furness, Weston-super-Mare, Cleethorpes, and Gravesend – the programme features an innovative model of collaboration between five established cultural organisations and the RNLI, an extraordinary national 24-hour rescue service led by volunteer lifeboat crews and seasonal lifeguards. The resulting work will be unveiled in spring 2025 and return to each location as part of a national tour.
This year, RNLI is celebrating 200 years since its founding. Since 1824 it has been saving lives at sea, powered by the courage and determination of its volunteers, and the generous support of the general public. With over 238 lifeboats stations across the UK and Ireland the RNLI has saved over 146,000 lives to date.
In each setting, White Horses will be accompanied by a series of projects by local artists in collaboration with the area’s community. In dialogue with Ivan’s central artwork, these local projects will open conversations on wellbeing, 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.
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. Delivered in collaboration with the Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI) and supported with public funding from Arts Council England.
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, Create North East Lincolnshire working with 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, “There is an eccentric tradition in Britain of the artist/writer/filmmaker’s coastal tour, to see what they see and reflect back to those that live there. There are people that live their lives in close connection to the sea, drawn to fish, to travel upon it, to immerse themselves in it, to search beneath it, to harness its power, to care for people in danger because of it. I am fascinated by these people and will spend my tour searching them out.
The sea and its storm state seems to me to be a suitable metaphor for modern life, with the RNLI’s volunteers, in their permanent state of absolute preparedness to help those in peril, suggesting something hopeful for all of our survival. Perhaps this work can help us look back at ourselves from the perspective of the sea, to better understand the nature of the storm.”
Claire Johnson, 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.”
Dates and details of the full programme will be announced in early 2025.