Campus welcomes Ashley Jackson paintings in open exhibition
The University's Vice-Chancellor, Professor Bob Cryan, with artist Ashley Jackson at the unveiling of the painting.
Thu, 15 May 2014 13:13:00 BST
University embraces art exhibition ... and the new Student Central Boardroom will be home to a Jackson original
YORKSHIRE artist Ashley Jackson, famous for capturing the atmospheric evocative landscapes of Yorkshire, is to be honoured with a permanent exhibition of his paintings at the University of the Year.
Ten dynamically unique paintings have been reproduced on vinyl to hang within the University of Huddersfield’s newly-finished £22.5 million Student Central building. As the main hub of the University, the building provides access to the art on a daily basis.
The open space and large white walls create a fantastic blank canvas for Jackson’s brooding open moorland scenes, enlarged to create a feeling that the viewer could step out of the University and into the landscape.
Jackson’s vision has always been to make art accessible to all often taking it away from the gallery context and into unusual thought-provoking locations such as a train, debit card and most recently an installation on Marsden Moor.
“It is fantastic moment,” says the artist, “to think that whatever course you are taking at the University, art is now part of that educational process and hopefully it will create a need to explore the landscapes surrounding Huddersfield, for truly there is beauty on the doorstep.”
A Jackson original
Alongside the exhibition, Mr Jackson has generously gifted an original painting (pictured above) to the University. It will hang in the boardroom at the University of Huddersfield, which last year bestowed an honorary doctorate on the artist.
At a special unveiling ceremony, the University’s Vice-Chancellor, Professor Bob Cryan, expressed his appreciation at the gift, describing Ashley Jackson as the poet in paint who has done more than any artist to celebrate the Pennine landscape.
“I can think of no university in the country that is quite as blessed as we are, in having beautiful, challenging, evocative, powerful and ever-changeable moorland and valley landscapes right on our doorstep,” said Professor Cryan.
“Ashley Jackson is the poet in paint who has done more than any artist to celebrate this landscape and to have one of his pictures – entitled Nature’s Moving Light – hanging here seems so right in every respect,” he continued.
The country’s most successful watercolourist
Ashley Jackson’s gallery is a popular attraction in Holmfirth and his fame as an artist has been spread by exhibitions, books and TV series.
Raised and educated in Barnsley, he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts at the age of 26. Since opening his first gallery in 1963, he has become one of the country’s most successful watercolourists. His distinctive paintings have become synonymous with the Yorkshire landscape, which he has described as his “mistress”. His works have been exhibited worldwide and adorn the walls of many successful and famous people, including former US Presidents, and in locations as varied as NATO headquarters.
He had his first series on BBC television in 1978. His Yorkshire Television series A Brush With Ashley ran for 12 years.
- More can be found about the artist and his work at www.ashley-jackson.co.uk.
