Leeds Art Fund

For the year that sees the anniversary of the Leeds Bridge, this talk by Nigel Walsh reflects on Atkinson Grimshaw’s relationship with the river, particularly through the lens of the recently acquired ‘Reflections on the Aire – on Strike’ (1879), and featuring other Grimshaw paintings in the Leeds Collection.

Without doubt, ‘Reflections on the Aire’ is one of the artist’s ‘moonlights’, though one of his most sombre nocturnal views, underscored with distinct Social Realist overtones, as its sur-title ‘on strike’ encapsulates. But just how might it relate to the picture he painted a year later, ‘Reflections on the Thames - Westminster’? It looks as if Grimshaw intended them to be companion pictures, but what were the events that surrounded them, and what stories might Grimshaw have meant to tell?

Booking https://www.eventbrite.com/e/a-tale-of-two-rivers-tickets-523512559157