'Slow Painting' exhibition to go on display at Leeds Art Gallery

Slow Painting, presented by Southbank Centre’s Hayward Gallery Touring, features work by 19 artists, each with their own unique style but all thematically linked by a desire to encourage people to pause and contemplate.

This week, a 'stunningly serene' collection of the paintings will go on display at Leeds Art Gallery "encouraging visitors to enjoy a change of pace and appreciate the beauty of taking it slow".

Curated by writer and critic Martin Herbert, the exhibition mostly showcases the work of British or UK-based artists working in figuration and abstraction.

Sarah Brown, principal keeper at Leeds Art Gallery, said: “Slow Painting invites us to take our time – in a world where we are used to such a fast pace of digital technology we invite audiences to spend time in the galleries looking at paintings that offer a window onto our contemporary world.”

Slow Painting highlights how shorter attention spans and the desire to make images that ‘pop’ on smartphones and computer screens could affect our appreciation of culture.

Artists whose work will be on display will include Allison Katz, Benjamin Senior, Tim Stoner and Simon Ling as well as Russian-born, Nottingham-based artist Yelena Popova.

A number of the works by Turner Prize winner Lubaina Himid and internationally-renowned Michael Armitage are also part of the exhibition and seating will be installed in the gallery so audiences can spend more time appreciating the paintings.

Martin Herbert, curator of the exhibition studied Fine Art at Leeds Metropolitan University in the early 90s and credits the city and the Leeds Art Gallery collection for his life-long love of painting.

He said: “Slow Painting aims to explore multiple aspects of what slowness might mean in relation to recent painting. The exhibition includes works that have taken long periods to gestate, and others that engage with spans of time, from the continuum of art history to wider cultural and political histories. All of them, though, reward sustained contemplation”.

Brian Cass, senior curator of Hayward Gallery Touring added: "There is something elemental in the act of painting that distinguishes it from the excess of images produced and consumed in contemporary life.

"Painting is an old, slow art, and this major exhibition explores its enduring vitality and presence, surveying a range of contemporary paintings that take their time and invite us, as viewers, to do the same. We are delighted to be presenting this exhibition with a range of wonderful exhibition partners around the UK".

Slow Painting will include a programme of artist’s talks in partnership with Leeds Beckett University including Benjamin Senior, who will be speaking about his work on December 5.

Opening at Leeds Art Gallery on October 24, Slow Painting then travels to The Levinsky Gallery in Plymouth on January 25, 2020.

For more details on the exhibition and talks, visit: https://museumsandgalleries.leeds.gov.uk/leeds-art-gallery/whats-on-at-leeds-art-gallery/