A stereo version of the 8 channel surround soundscape created for the Neolithic cannibals exhibition at Brighton Festival 2024.


Gallery introduction
Overlooking Whitehawk Estate to the East and the rest of the city to the West sits Whitehawk Hill, a species-rich chalk grassland visible from far and wide and easily distinguishable with its TV mast and the grandstand for Brighton Racecourse.

In 1929, Cecil Curwen and a team of archaeologists and labourers used sound and listening through an early geophysical technique called ‘Bosing’, to reveal a  5500-year-old Neolithic camp here, and although much is uncertain about how this 'Causewayed Enclosure' was used, we do know that it was a place of communion, celebration, and ritual -  a place for people to connect.

95 years later, a group of young Whitehawk sound artists have listened to and sounded the contemporary environment of East Brighton, using the Whitehawk Hill Neolithic Camp as a focal point and inspiration for their sonic explorations.

The sounds they have uncovered and created are presented here as a looping 20-minute multi-speaker collage, a contemporary artefact that sits alongside finds, illustrations, plans and reports from Cecil Curwen and colleagues’ archaeological excavations. 

In this compassionate listening space we hope the imaginative and fantastical sounds will invite deep listening to an area that can often be considered hidden and unheard.

Artists
Ieuan
Amelia
Amy
Gracie-May
Harry
Izzy
Leonie
Tassia
Sophia

Neolithic Cannibals is a Class Divide production directed by Simon James, commissioned by Brighton Festival and produced in partnership with Lighthouse.

Creative Direction for Class Divide
Curtis James

Exhibition design
Emily Macaulay

Partners
Archaeology South East/UCL
Brighton and Hove Museums
The Crew Club

Funders
Brighton Festival
Chalk Cliff Trust
Necessity

Neolithic Cannibals soundscape

A socially engaged sound art project and exhibition from the young people of Whitehawk and East Brighton, and artist Simon James, who was born and raised in Whitehawk.

Explored through the deep time history of the Neolithic in East Brighton and the contemporary soundscape of Whitehawk, the Neolithic Cannibals exhibition mixes archaeology, sound art, and activism to transport audiences to a place where imaginative and fantastical sounds will invite deep listening to an area that can often be considered hidden and unheard.

Neolithiccannibals

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