The "Ever Present" exhibition will take place at the Malthouse Gallery, Town Mill Courtyard, Lyme Regis DT7 3PD, from Monday 27th October to Wednesday 5th November 2025. Open daily 10-5.

About the Exhibition

This autumn, twelve professional artists and makers, each specially selected by local curator Alison Shelton Brown, will showcase a wide variety of high-quality gifts, objects, and artworks in Lyme Regis. The event offers items at a range of accessible prices, making it an ideal opportunity to find meaningful, unique gifts in anticipation of the Christmas season. Visitors and locals alike are encouraged to support small businesses and independent creatives by choosing presents that endure and bring joy.

Featured Artists

Many of the twelve exhibitors are residents of Dorset, drawing inspiration from the region’s stunning landscapes and vibrant way of life.

·      Russell Coulson, a resident of Charmouth, has an extensive background as an art director in advertising, ran his own design studio collaborating with Disney and Warner Bros, and has illustrated for periodicals and children's books. He is passionate about exploring the expressive potential of colour—using its vibrancy and power to create atmosphere in his landscapes and portraits. Russell is also fascinated by the possibilities of line drawing, continually experimenting with how far a line can be pushed before it collapses into abstraction or cartoon.

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Jane Colquhoun takes inspiration from the Jurassic Coast, and is currently developing clay Ammonite Head figures alongside her popular free-machine stitched textile figures.

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Alex Brooks is a furniture maker who works with large pieces of local weather-damaged wood, crafting unique coffee tables that reveal polished, miniature universes—perfect statement pieces for discerning homes.

I met husband and wife Robert McKenzie and Julia McKenzie a couple of times when they visited previous shows I've organised at Lyme and have taken the opportunity this time to invite them to take part this autumn. Robert is drawn to the minutiae of nature, collecting objects that catch his eye, seeing beauty in the smallest thing, an exquisite feather or a pebble, the pages of an old book or a long lost key. Watercolour is the perfect medium to capture these moments. Robert paints in a forensic way, building up layers of washes, slowly adding detail to create the illusion that the objects could be lifted from the page. Julia often incorporates complex paper cuts and collaged maps entangled with line in her practice. She finds inspiration in nature, particularly the "fragile, forgotten, and broken" remnants of the natural world that she encounters on her travels, or by the sea. 

Also taking part are painters Kimmy Thomson, and Zee Jones. Jeweller Robin Shelton, enamellist Janine Partington, with ceramics by Jane Staniland and Alison Shelton Brown.