The 11,000-acre Goodwood Estate houses works by a number of the most celebrated contemporary artists and sculptors
Octetra by artist Isamu Noguchi
Past the 4,000-acre organic farm with its vast stone walls, past the racecourse, the historic motor circuit, the two 18-hole golf courses, the cricket club, the flying school, the hotel and Rolls-Royce HQ, I arrive at the Goodwood Art Foundation. Set at the foot of the Sussex Downs, the Goodwood Estate and its myriad enterprises seem to take up half of West Sussex, but in fact it’s just 11,000 acres, or nearly 7,000 football pitches.
It’s famous, of course, for cars. When Charles Henry Gordon-Lennox, the Duke of Richmond, took over the management of Goodwood House in 1994, his grandfather had been running the Goodwood Motor Circuit since 1948. The Duke of Richmond founded the hugely successful Goodwood Festival of Speed and the Goodwood Revival, which celebrates the golden era of motoring.
But the Duke of Richmond is much more than a petrolhead: he escaped Eton as quickly as he could to establish a career in film and photography, working as a crew member on Stanley Kubrick’s period masterpiece Barry Lyndon at the age of 17 and later becoming a respected fine art photographer. It should come as no surprise, then, that he has now turned his attention to art, photography and sculpture.
Magic Square #3 by artist Hélio Oiticica
The Goodwood Art Foundation, which had a previous life as the Cass Sculpture Foundation before sadly closing in 2020, opened last spring, offering the experience of contemporary art amid 70 acres of ancient woodland. It’s a joy, from the extremely nice car park (this is Goodwood, after all) to Café 24, a stunning building clad in glass and aluminium with a terrace positioned beneath a leafy canopy – you can sit with a choice of seasonal small plates and pretend you’re pretty much anywhere in the world, if Sussex doesn’t feel exotic enough.
But it’s the art that makes the not-for-profit Foundation a hot destination: the summer season includes Yayoi Kusama’s large-scale sculptures (recognisable by her trademark polka dots and bright colours) and the first outdoor sculpture in Europe by Hélio Oiticica, but there are also more permanent works by the likes of Veronica Ryan, who won the 2022 Turner Prize (her magnolia blossoms are delicate, poetic paeans to nature) and the late Japanese artist Isamu Noguchi, one of the most celebrated sculptors of the 20th century.
In the two spacious, light-filled galleries, the season embraces the work of the American land-artist Nancy Holt, and Eva Rothschild, who works with leather, resin, wood and acrylic plaster and refers to her style as “magic minimalism”.
Sun Tunnels (1973–76) by artist Nancy Holt
Ann Gallagher, who had worked at the Tate for over a decade, is consulting on ‘the curatorial vision for the Foundation’. She had visited the Cass Sculpture Foundation on several occasions and was aware of the magical nature of its location, protected by trees but, on a clear day, with views out to the sea. Gallagher works closely with the Duke of Richmond when curating the programme. ‘We are aware that some people might come and just walk through the landscape, coming across sculptures as they wander; others come specifically for the art. The [interior and exterior art] shouldn’t be in conflict; it should all have some relationship with the landscape.’
Gallagher also has a symbiotic working relationship with landscape designer Dan Pearson, who is in the process of adding native species to the woodland, alongside a wildflower meadow and a katsura grove (the leaves are copper in the spring, amber in the autumn). ‘Dan is very keen for the landscape to complement the art and vice versa; it’s all about exchanging ideas.’
When Gallagher came on board during the pandemic, she found a quasi-abandoned site that was overgrown, muddy and in desperate need of attention. Green public spaces had a high premium back then; the premium remains as the UK is one of the most nature-depleted countries in the world. There is nothing quite like a bit of forest bathing, investigating some contemporary art and having a coffee under the trees. Gallagher, of course, agrees. ‘The Foundation will change each year, so there will be a necessity for people to come back and see what’s different.’
