A NEW exhibition exploring the lives of a Victorian farming family will open next week.

From 4 August until 12 September, the Rotunda Gallery in the Lyme Regis Museum will be hosting one artist’s fascinating exploration of her ancestry in the 'Family Geology: Stratification of Sarah' exhibition.

Jan Edwards is a paper and book artist and member of Lyme Bay Arts, whose Victorian ancestors were farmers who worked on the land in the Norfolk fenlands and later, after emigrating, in the Australian outback.

They understood the geology of their landscape in an intimate yet harsh manner, and this installation is a fictionalised representation of their story, an homage to their courage and tenacity in searching for a better life.

Inspired by family documents about her great aunt Sarah - who at the age of 10 went unaccompanied to Australia with her younger brother - Jan has created a series of artworks that resonate physically and colourfully with the geology of these different homelands.