On my radar: Delaine Le Bas’s cultural highlights

Delaine Le Bas was born in Worthing in 1965. She studied art at West Sussex College of Design and then Central Saint Martins. Her wide-ranging work uses embroidery, painting, decoupage, sculpture, performance and other media to explore her Roma heritage and address issues of nationhood, land, belonging and gender. Last year she was shortlisted for the Turner prize, for Incipit Vita Nova. Le Bas, who lives in Worthing, is currently artist-in-residence at The White House in Dagenham, where her exhibition Stranger in Silver Walking on Air is open to the public free of charge until 27 September. Her new show +Fabricating My Own Myth – Red Threads & Silver Needles runs at Newcastle Contemporary Art until 2 August.

Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch: Vollmond, at Sadler’s Wells, London

I wanted to do ballet as a child but didn’t get to do lessons. Now, if there’s any excuse to go see some dance in a theatre, I take it. Vollmond was one of Pina Bausch’s last works and I was absolutely stunned by the energy of the performers: they just didn’t stop. They were wearing these amazing long dresses and were dancing ankle-deep in water. I am never disappointed at the theatre; I always feel excited like a child who’s going for the first time. At Sadler’s Wells we always sit right at the back to get the bird’s-eye view.

Lily Tree Bakery, Newcastle

I have a wheat and nut allergy, so I’m always looking to find a bakery that makes bread and cakes without either – and that don’t taste like cardboard. I’m staying in Newcastle at the moment, because of my new show, and there’s a bakery just up the road that does the most amazing bread and cakes. I had an amazing lemon drizzle cake, and a baguette that actually tasted like a baguette. But be warned: if you go on Saturday and get there late, like I did last weekend, there won’t be much left. I just wish there was a place like this close to where I live.

Ordinary Notes by Christina Sharpe

I just bought this book, having discovered a copy at a dear friend’s flat. It’s a series of notes written over a period of time that deal with Black life in America. Note 51 particularly resonates with me. It’s about a purple gingham dress that Christina Sharpe’s mother, Ida, made for her; it reminded me of a pair of red felt boots and a piece of embroidered binca that I created at school which my nan held on to for me. Sometimes I flick through a book and something immediately draws me in, and that was very much the case with Ordinary Notes.

Ithell Colquhoun at Tate Britain, London (opening 13 June)

I was very sad to miss this at Tate St Ives. I love Cornwall and to see this work in the landscape where some of it was created would have been fantastic. But I’m looking forward to catching it at Tate Britain. It’s the first major exhibition of Colquhoun’s works. She was part of the surrealist movement but got expelled because she was an occultist as well. They wouldn’t let you be in more than one group, which seems a bit mean, really. The work is very surreal but she’s definitely got her own style and the colour palette is beautiful.

The Girl With the Needle (dir Magnus von Horn, 2024) 

I saw this at the ICA in January. It was not an easy watch but I found it mesmerising. It’s set in Copenhagen at the end of the first world war and it’s about a young woman who works as a seamstress in a factory. Her husband’s gone missing, presumably killed in action, and she gets involved with the factory owner, who gets her pregnant. Then her husband shows up. It’s a really compelling watch. The acting, the costumes, the locations, everything about it was brilliant. A stunning piece of work.

Worthing beach

The beach from Worthing along to East Preston is my favourite place. I’ve been going since I was a child and it’s been my happiness in the best of times and my comfort in the worst. I usually have my birthday on the beach. We take a picnic and get friends to come along and spend the whole day there, right into the evening, because the best thing to do is watch the sun go down. I can’t swim – I’ll go up to my neck in the water but that’s it. I love it there all year round, in all weathers.