Belonging in Crawley exhibition

Belonging in Crawley

1 Jun 2023 - 29 Jul 2023
Thursday, Friday, Saturday 10:30-16:00
Free admission, donations welcomed

The Belonging in Crawley Exhibition, in Crawley Museum, represents the culmination of a year of workshops and discussions with community groups and individuals, exploring the theme of Belonging.

The project is run by Crawley Museums and funded by Art Council England.

Like the museum itself, Belonging In Crawley, celebrates a sense of place and home. Some have chosen to create works that show the connections that make us part of a community. Some have celebrated the town itself, and some have chosen to take inspiration from everyday household objects in the museum’s collection and see where their imagination takes them.

There were images and thoughts from a wide range of participants and there were opportunities for visitors to the Museum to take part in further workshops and contribute their own thoughts on Belonging, while the exhibition was on display.

Gallery

Click images to enlarge

Project introduction

Engagement board outlining the engagement activities taken during the project.

Interaction between communities during the project.

Acceptance stories from members of the communities.

Refugees Welcome, children from the group made leaves with personal messages of their experience of Belonging in Crawley.

Refugees Welcome, adults in the group created a tree with messages for the people of Crawley.

Steve, a member of Crawley Town Football Club Community Foundation, personal story of his involvement and sense of belonging with the club.

Crawley Community Youth Service explaining their contribution of egg people and bottle monsters, inspired by items from the museum collection.

Crawley Writers Circle members interpreted the theme of Belonging in Crawley with photographs to illustrate the writing.

Local students input their feeling of belonging.

Visitors to the exhibition were invited to leave their own thoughts about Belonging in Crawley.

View of the exhibition as you enter the gallery.

Loaned handicrafts representing hobbies and belonging to clubs and societies.

Roots and Crossings Case. Display of items relating to families and migration.

Roots and Crossings Case- Items representing a family's journey from Kashmir to Crawley.

Family Roots – by Victoria Izzard Belonging in Crawley to me is all about family. My great grandparents Alexander and Olive Eades moved from London to Crawley in 1955 and it was from this move that five generations of our family have proudly called Crawley our home. I have many wonderful memories from my childhood growing up in Crawley with my great grandparents and grandparents being the heart of our family.

We are being loaned Home Office registration certificates from people who came to Crawley in the 1990s and now regard it as home.

Refugees Welcome display of tree and boards with messages of belonging and thanks.

Not featured in the exhibition but as part of the project, members of Refugees Welcome Crawley sewed bags to show how they feel about belonging in Crawley and the fact that they may have to leave.

Refugees Welcome, close up of the tree with hand written messages from the group members. Visitors could add their own messages if they wished to.

Outreach 3 Way have created a model of places that are special to them in the town.

Outreach3Way- close up of their model of the areas of Crawley they feel they belong.

Crawley Town Football Club Community Foundation have produced a family tree of prominent members of the club.

Close up detail of CTFCCF family tree.

Crawley Community Youth Service have produced a number of items inspired by their imagination and objects from the museum collection resulting in bottle monsters and egg people.

Close up of the bottles used as inspiration for the bottle monster t-shirts and graphic.

Close up of bottle monster t-shirts.

‘Egg Mutations’ by local Youth Artists at CCYS aged 8-17yrs 3D Pen made artworks, ‘PLA’ material and mixed media Inspired by the Eastern European ‘Hepner Kobalt Devilled ceramic egg plate’, donated by Crawley Museum