'Don't Let's Ask for the Moon...': Nocturnes and Atkinson Grimshaw

14 Nov 2025-19 Apr 2026

John Atkinson Grimshaw, Reflections on the Aire – on strike, 1879, oil on canvas. Credit: © Leeds Museums & Galleries, acquired through the Patricia Hurst bequest (Leeds Art Fund)

Overview

This new exhibition brings together Leeds Art Gallery's impressive collection of nocturnal pictures by the celebrated artist Atkinson Grimshaw, including the latest acquisition Reflections on the Aire - on strike (1879) - likely to be one of the first paintings depicting the consequences of industrial action.

The show aims to shift our perceptions of Atkinson Grimshaw as a painter of place, providing a window of nostalgia onto a Victorian world. Alongside evocative images of nocturnal themes by four contemporary painters - Elizabeth Magill, Selma Makela, Judith Tucker and Joanna Whittle - and neon and photographic works by Roger Palmer, Atkinson Grimshaw can be seen here as a painter of modernity, possessed of a powerful poetry.

Artists