IMPORTANT: The Artists Open Houses festival has been rescheduled and will now take place in November /December 2020

Art in Ditchling is a group of local artists who participate in Brighton Artists Open Houses during The Brighton Festival.  The Art in Ditchling Trail showcases a range of high quality art, design and craft in houses, studios and workshops.  Make a day of it to meet the artists and makers, explore the historic village and visit Ditchling Museum of Art+Craft. 

Ann Raby 1931 – 2019

The 2020 Art in Ditchling trail is dedicated to the memory of Ann Raby.
Ann had a long and varied career.  She was born and brought up in Brighton in a family that included George Chester R.A. (a fashionable Victorian landscape painter) and Margaret Milnes the Ditchling illustrator and portrait artist.  As a child Ann was always drawing and painting.  She went to Brighton Art School then the Royal College of Art in London.

Ann worked in London as a staff artist at Odhams Press. Her work included that in “Woman” magazine and decorative covers for L.P. records.

During marriage and family she specialised in watercolours and was commissioned to paint houses and gardens, she also helped run a gallery in Kew (close to the gardens).

In the 1980s whilst living in Surrey, she came to Sussex and was instrumental in re-opening the Ditchling Gallery in the High Street.  In 2005 she moved to Ditchling and participated in “Art in Ditchling” from the early days, showing pictures, sculpture and jewellery by local artists as “Art at Kennel Cottage”.

She continued to work, producing and publishing greeting cards and prints from her vibrant watercolours to the end.