This Is My Brighton 2026: Four Weeks, Four Themes, One City

This Is My Brighton opens at The Vault Contemporary Art Salon on Sunday 20 September, and it's a big one for Wach'Art. It's their first major civic open-call exhibition, which means the work on the walls didn't come from a closed studio — it was called for from the city itself. The result is a collective portrait of Brighton, put together by artists, photographers, writers, makers and local people. It's a wide net to cast, and the mix of voices is exactly what the whole thing is built on.

The exhibition runs from 20 to 28 September, and it's structured around four themes: Places, People and Communities, Hidden Brighton and Future Brighton. Each one gets its own focus across the four weekends, so you can come back and see how the city looks from a different angle each time. It's not just about looking at art, either — the themes are worked through with conversation, storytelling and hands-on workshops, so there's a social side to it as much as a visual one.

Wach'Art describes it as an invitation to participate and connect, rather than just an exhibition to visit, and that's a good way to put it. The whole point is to get people talking about the city and to help shape Brighton's evolving cultural story, so it's as much about the people in the room as the work on the walls.

It's open on 20, 21, 24, 25, 26, 27 and 28 September, from 11:00 to 18:00, so you've got plenty of options for when to drop in. You'll find it at The Vault Contemporary Art Salon, 42-43 King Roads Arches, BN1 2LN, and a standard ticket is £3.00.