LEEDS.- A new exhibition at The Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery, challenges our expectations of landscape painting and invites us to think outside the box. The exhibition rethinks landscape painting for the 21st century - a time of climate crisis, a post COVID-19 world, a post-colonial and capitalist era.

Arcadia for All? Rethinking Landscape Painting Now raises pertinent questions about who has access to nature, where and how. It acknowledges that in the 21st century people in the UK access and experience landscape now in many ways. This could be through walking in parks or on footpaths, working in community gardens and allotments, or looking longingly on our screens at faraway places we may never visit in person.

Opening on Wednesday 26 April, the exhibition features a wonderfully broad spectrum of artworks by over thirty artists. They approach nature from many different directions, expanding the notion of landscape painting in new, unexpected and sometimes radical and playful ways.

The exhibition celebrates the vitality and variety of contemporary painting in all its materiality and visual richness.

Participating artists include Hurvin Anderson, Andrew Grassie, Lubaina Himid, Matthew Krishanu, Elizabeth Magill and George Shaw.

Arcadia for All? explores the fragility of our environment as a result of human activity and highlights some of the pressures that capitalism is imposing on nature.

The exhibition has been guest curated by Dr Judith Tucker, Senior Lecturer at the School of Design, University of Leeds and Geraint Evans, Pathway Leader MA Fine Art: Painting at Camberwell College of Arts, University of the Arts London.

Guest curator Judith Tucker said: These are paintings which address the urgent issues of our time. They open difficult questions yet together become a visual feast. The richness of the works both conceptually and visually is astonishing and bringing them into conversation with each other opens up further debate. It is really exciting to be able to bring such a strong and powerful show to Leeds.

Guest curator Geraint Evans said: It has been a privilege to explore the range of pressing issues about our relationship to landscape now and, how painting reflects this, through the work of such a dynamic group of contemporary artists. This exhibition of inventive paintings creates potent dialogues that engage with ideas and experiences of landscape such as access, encounter, ownership and identity. I am very happy to be able to present this exhibition of wonderful work at The Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery and to share it with the people of Leeds and beyond.

Exhibitions Curator Laura Claveria said: At a time of serious ecological crisis when pollution and unsustainable ocean and land use are threatening both ecosystems and human existence, the exhibition Arcadia for All? feels more relevant than ever. We are very excited to be able to share these amazing and thought-provoking artworks with the University of Leeds’ community and everyone in Leeds.

Arcadia for All? Rethinking Landscape Painting Now launches at a special preview event on Tuesday 25 April 2023, 18:00 – 20:00 at The Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery and runs from Wednesday 26 April 2023 until Saturday 29 July 2023