New British Rural · A programme of art and film

New British Rural.

Art and film in working rural places — in the pub, the barn and the yard, among the people the story is about.

Most recent edition

Friday 21 August 2026
Third edition

Venue

Vernham Dean Village Hall
and The George Inn, Hampshire SP11 0JY

In aid of

Two charities
Test Valley Arts Foundation and the Farming Community Network

Third edition

Derek vs Derek — a film night, Friday 21 August 2026. The evening was well attended and warmly received. Further editions will follow; register your interest below.

Two Devon farmers. One shared name.

Over the hedge from each other. Derek Banbury has built his father's dairy herd from fifty cows to two hundred — feeding the nation, as he sees it. Derek Gow, an ex-sheep farmer the press call a maverick rewilder, is taking his own farm apart: ponds dug, beavers in the streams, wild boar turning the grass.

They do not agree. Filmed over three years — warm, rude and very funny about how a view hardens, and how it sometimes moves.

Dir. James Dawson · UK, 2026 · 60 mins

Doors opened at six and supper was served in the village hall. The film ran at half past seven, and the talking carried on at The George afterwards.

Admission to this screening was restricted to agricultural professionals by special permission of the film's distributor. Conditions vary from edition to edition and are set out when each one is announced.

All profits were split between the Test Valley Arts Foundation and the Farming Community Network.


What they're saying

Warm, rude and very funny.

Engagingly eccentric crowd-pleaser

Screen Daily

It's absolutely brilliant! Loved every second.

Isabella Tree, Knepp

It's not farming. It's just a mess.

Derek Banbury, dairy farmer

We need nature to be restored.

Derek Gow, rewilder

Register your interest.

Editions are announced a few weeks ahead and places are limited. Tell us you would like to hear about the next one and we will let you know when it is confirmed.

Declared interest. Kate Mieczkowska, who curates New British Rural, is a trustee of the Test Valley Arts Foundation, which receives a share of the profits from these events.

Register interest

Where we have been.

Third edition — Friday 21 August 2026. Derek vs Derek, a film night at Vernham Dean Village Hall and The George Inn, in partnership with the Test Valley Arts Foundation and the Farming Community Network.

Second edition — Sunday 7 June 2026. Copse Farm, Kingsworthy, Winchester, for Open Farm Sunday, in partnership with the Test Valley Arts Foundation.

Art and film where the subject actually lives.

New British Rural puts art and film in working rural places, among the people the story is about — not in a city gallery, but in the pub, the barn and the yard.

The initiative is curated by Kate Mieczkowska, a Winchester School of Art and Chelsea College of Art trained fine artist and Associate Artist at Chapel Arts Studios. Painting on the Hoof sessions run alongside the programme, linking the equestrian and creative sides of Outwith Horses.

Test Valley Arts Foundation The George Inn, Vernham Dean Farming Community Network

Painting on the Hoof. Sessions run alongside the programme at Windmill Hill, Ibthorpe, linking the equestrian and creative sides of Outwith Horses.

Art & Wellbeing → katemieczkowska.com ↗