Exhibitions in the North

Maja Lorkowska, Exhibitions Editor

Before the craziness of Christmas takes over our minds, homes and wallets, we’ve done the hard work and rounded up some of the best new exhibitions to see in the North right now.

Folklore, ritual, plant consciousness and story-telling are recurring motifs through a number of shows: LORE at Sunny Bank Mills in Leeds and Cosmotechnics at FACT in Liverpool.

Louise Giovanelli: A Song of Ascents at the Hepworth Wakefield is a solo exhibition of the artist’s impressive large-scale paintings and masterful visual trickery.

The Skin We Live In: Portraits from the NGCA Collection challenges traditional portraiture with a group display of portraits that favour the collective experience over recording a likeness, while the Lowry presents the first in a series of exhibitions titled International / Local / National, with a trio of shows from contemporary ceramic artists.

Our top picks

LORE at Sunny Bank Mills

LORE at Sunny Bank Mills Gallery, Leeds, Until 24 December 2024, free entry - Visit now

14 artists explore folklore through modern approaches while remaining true to its roots: stories passed down through generations.

A woodland glade. In the centre is the bough of a tree draped with different coloured ribbons. There are two wooden footstools underneath the ribbons.
Image supplied by Leeds Inspired

Louise Giovanelli: A Song of Ascents at The Hepworth Wakefield

Louise Giovanelli: A Song of Ascents at The Hepworth Wakefield, West Yorkshire, Until 21 April 2025, from £0.00 - Book now

The Hepworth Wakefield’s new exhibition gathers Giovanelli’s luminous large-scale canvases, showcasing the artist’s skill as well as her musings on contemporary worship and the duality of human experience.

A painting of green and yellow curtains
Louise Giovanelli, Prairie, 2022 © Louise Giovanelli. All Rights Reserved, DACS/Artimage. Photo © White Cube (Ollie Hammick). Courtesy of the artist and White Cube

LOCAL / NATIONAL / INTERNATIONAL at the Lowry

Local National International at The Lowry, Manchester, Until 16 February 2025, free entry - Visit now

Artists Aliyah Hussain, Paloma Proudfoot and Renee So, all of whom work with ceramics, open a new series of exhibitions at the Lowry with three individual, concurrent displays.

Paloma Proudfoot, Skin Poem, 2024.
Reliant Imaging. Courtesy of the artist and The Approach, London

The Skin We Live In: Portraits from the NGCA Collection at NGCA

The Skin We Live In: Portraits from the NGCA Collection at Northern Gallery for Contemporary Art, North East, Until 2 March 2025, free entry - Visit now

See portraiture like never before at the NGCA’s group show, gathering works in photography, paint and print where portraits carry more than just a likeness.

Walker & Bromwich, Love Cannon, 2006, lambda print Photo:
Courtesy of the artist.

Cosmotechnics at FACT

Cosmotechnics at FACT, Liverpool, Until 26 January 2025, free entry - Visit now

Can local ways of thinking influence the development of technology? Can plants have their say in this too? Find out at FACT’s new exhibition featuring work from four Latin American artists and collectives.

A sculpture of a flower, lit with a purple and green animation. To the right of the sculpture is a red, floating circle.
Rebeca Romero, Chrysalis (2024) in Cosmotechnics (2024) curated by Beatrice Zaidenberg. Installation view at FACT Liverpool. Photography by Rob Battersby

Acts of Creation: On Art and Motherhood at Millennium Gallery

Acts of Creation: On Art and Motherhood at Millennium Gallery, Sheffield, Until 19 January 2025, free entry - Visit now

On art and motherhood with raw honesty – Millennium Gallery welcomes the Hayward Gallery Touring exhibition that dives deep into motherhood as experienced by artists.

Black and white photograph. Woman lays on bed looking at the camera, in the background, a little girl with Downs Syndrome irons.
Anna Grevenitis, Regard series (2015 -). © Anna Grevenitis

Play Interact Explore at BALTIC

Play Interact Explore at BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art, North East, Until 27 April 2025, free entry - Visit now

Come and visit the BALTIC to play with the objects created especially to be interacted with, where ‘please do touch’ is the main rule!

Colourful blocks and sculpture
leap then look

Liz West: Our Colour Reflection at Yorkshire Sculpture Park

Liz West: Our Colour Reflection at Yorkshire Sculpture Park, West Yorkshire, Until 5 January 2025, from £0.00 - Book now

Boost your mood with YSP’s brand new vivid winter installation from an artist who investigates how colour can affect us.

A person in a chapel looking at multicoloured circular discs
Liz West, Our Colour Reflection, 2016. Courtesy the artist. Photo © Hannah Devereux

Lawson Oyekan at Blackwell, The Arts and Crafts House

Lawson Oyekan at Blackwell, The Arts and Crafts House, Cumbria, Until 16 March 2025, from £0.00 - Book now

Experience Lawson Oyekan’s monumental ceramic sculptures at first hand at his solo show this season. 

Lawson Oyekan, Coming up for air, 1999
The artist

Barbara Walker: Being Here at The Whitworth

Barbara Walker at The Whitworth, Manchester, Until 26 January 2025, free entry - Visit now

Expect to be moved as you encounter an incredible body of work by Turner Prize-nominated artist Barbara Walker.

The artist Barbara Walker, is a standing figure, working on her wall-drawing Vanishing Point. She draws four large figures of people on a large gallery wall.
Barbara Walker working on her wall-drawing Vanishing Point at Cristea Roberts Gallery, 2022. Courtesy Cristea Roberts Gallery. Photo: Helen Waters

earth to heart at Manchester Craft and Design Centre

earth to heart Exhibition at Manchester Craft & Design Centre, Manchester, Until 24 December 2024, free entry - Visit now

Exploring what creativity really means while experimenting with clay, this exhibition from artist Lily Brown and duo Imprints of Earth is a showcase of the possibilities of the material and the potential of working with imperfections.

Person holding two white ceramics
Lily Brown

Songs for the Storm to Come at HOME

Songs for the Storm to Come at HOME Manchester, Manchester, Until 2 February 2025, free entry - Visit now

Music faces the climate crisis and predictions of the future in Mikhail Karikis new, socially engaged exhibition at HOME.

Songs for the Storm to Come
HOME

40 Years of the Future: Jo McGonigal x Frank Bowling at Castlefield Gallery

40 Years of the Future: Jo McGonigal x Frank Bowling at Castlefield Gallery, Manchester, Until 2 February 2025, free entry - Visit now

Despite creating decades apart, the work of Jo McGonigal and Frank Bowling finds common ground in a show that explores spatial relationships and architecture.

A minimalist art installation features geometric wire sculptures, a neon light in front of a black rectangle made of gesso, and two wooden doors with windows on either side in a white-walled room.
Jo McGonigal, Unsaid. So-said. Missaid. (2019) at Edinburgh College of Art. Image courtesy of the artist.

Into The Wyld at Williamson Art Gallery & Museum

Into The Wyld at Williamson Art Gallery, Birkenhead, Until 21 December 2024, free entry - Visit now

One artist collective, three exhibitions, 20 artists and one medieval poem all come together to form Into The Wyld festival, a one-of-a-kind set of events exploring the legacy of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, uniquely connected to the Wirral.

Graphic text reads Material Matters presents Into The Wyld a Journey into Arthuriana. All text is white, background is a green moss in which the outline of an ancient-looking caved man's face can be made out
Material Matters Collective

Is This What We Have Left? at Hyde Park Book Club

Is This What We Have Left? - Kate O’Neill, Marta Dyczkowska and James Thompson at Hyde Park Book Club, Leeds, Until 19 December 2024, free entry - Visit now

Kate O’Neill, Marta Dyczkowska and James Thompson focus on place and consider the implications of losing art spaces in cities as part of rapid change and development.

Exhibition  Is This What We Have Left?  featuring never shown and new works by artists Kate O’Neill, Marta Dyczkowska and James Thompson. Show opens 19/09/2024 at our  home Hyde Park Book Club, and focused on the current dialogues we are having as creatives around space.
Image supplied by Leeds Inspired

Lubna Chowdhary: PLURIVERSE at Graves Gallery

Lubna Chowdhary: PLURIVERSE at Graves Gallery, Sheffield, Until 21 December 2024, free entry - Visit now

Creating a bridge between different visual languages, Lubna Chowdhary’s satisfyingly simple forms encompass the concept of the ‘multiplicity of worlds’.

Lubna Chowdhary, Re Verse, 2024. Courtesy the artist and Jhaveri Contemporary. Photo credit: Andrew Judd

Wild at Manchester Museum

Wild at Manchester Museum, Manchester, Until 1 June 2025, free entry - Visit now

Manchester Museum’s new exhibition focuses on all things wild or related to the concept of wildness. From environmental campaigns that lead to restoring ecosystems to romanticised landscape paintings, the show gathers different approaches and practices.

Wolf in Yellowstone
Jacob W. Frank

Stephen Hawking at Work at the Science and Industry Museum

Stephen Hawking at Work at Science and Industry Museum, Manchester, Until 30 September 2025, free entry - Visit now

Explore incredible objects from the world-renowned theoretical physicist’s office in this special display.

Stephen Hawking at Work
Science Museum Group - © The Board of Trustees of the Science Museum.

Hannah Perry: Manual Labour at Baltic

Hannah Perry: Manual Labour at BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art, North East, Until 15 March 2025, free entry - Visit now

Hannah Perry’s explorations of matrescence in combination with class, labour and industrial materials is a unique perspective on this still underexplored topic.

A pregnant woman standing in a mirror
Hannah Perry © Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art

Bharti Kher: Alchemies at Yorkshire Sculpture Park

Bharti Kher: Alchemies at Yorkshire Sculpture Park, West Yorkshire, Until 27 April 2025, from £0.00 - Book now

One of the world’s leading contemporary artists, Bharti Kher comes to the Yorkshire Sculpture Park with a body of work that focuses on the female experience and its shifting context in today’s world.

Sculpture of a nude woman with the head of a cow placed on top of the woman's head
Bharti Kher, Animus Mundi (detail), 2018. © Bharti Kher. Courtesy of the artist and Nature Morte. Photo © Jeetin Sharma.

Bees: A Story of Survival at World Museum Liverpool

Bees: A Story of Survival at World Museum Liverpool, Liverpool, Until 5 May 2025, from £0.00 - Book now

Take a closer look at the lives of bees and their vital role in human existence, in this immersive exhibition created in partnership with artist Wolfgang Buttress.

Bees: A Story of Survival at World Museum Liverpool
© Photo by Pete Carr - Render by Battlecat and Wolfgang Buttress Studios

40 Years of the Future at Castlefield Gallery

40 Years of the Future at Castlefield Gallery, Manchester, Until 30 March 2025, free entry - Visit now

Manchester’s beloved Castlefield Gallery is turning 40! Check out the exciting programme of events taking place throughout the year

A dynamic painting of colourful shapes arranged to form a cross
Hoyland Studio Ltd

2024 Exhibition Highlights at the Whitworth

Exhibition Highlights 2024 at The Whitworth, Manchester, Until 31 December 2024, free entry - Visit now

Mark these art dates in your diary – The Whitworth prepares for a new year of fantastic exhibitions with work from Shirley Craven, John Lyons, Ayo Akingbade and Barbara Walker.

Colourful figures painted in oil paint on cavas background
Shirley Craven for Hull Traders, Five (detail), 1966-67. Screen-printed furnishing textile. The Whitworth, the University of Manchester (T.12298.2). Photo: Michael Pollard.

Unpicking Couture at Manchester Art Gallery

Unpicking Couture at Manchester Art Gallery, Manchester, Until 12 July 2025, free entry - Visit now

Whether you’re a high-fashion fanatic or just couture curious, get up close and personal with pivotal moments in fashion history.

 

 

Unpicking Couture
Image: Dress, Pierre Cardin, 1994

Liverpool Biennial 2025 – BEDROCK

Liverpool Biennial 2023, 7 June–14 September 2025, free entry - Find Out More

The largest contemporary art festival in the UK is back! The 12th edition focuses on themes of healing and the titular keyword “uMoya” means spirit and breath, calling for the return of ancestral knowledge and wisdom.

 

 

A grid of pink and cream waves laid on top of an orange gradient background. The text beneath the grid reads 'BEDROCK'  alongside the LB2025 dates
LB2025 Visual Identity by Salt And Sister Studio

More exhibitions events

A sculpture of a flower, lit with a purple and green animation. To the right of the sculpture is a red, floating circle.
Until
ExhibitionsLiverpool
Cosmotechnics at FACT

‘Cosmotechnics’ at FACT brings together Latin American artists to reconsider our relationships with both technology and the natural world.

free entry
Wolf in Yellowstone
Until
ExhibitionsManchester
Wild at Manchester Museum

Manchester Museum explores the concept of ‘wild’ nature as a means of tackling the climate and biodiversity crisis in a new exhibition.

free entry
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Exhibitions in the North

HOME Manchester
Manchester
Theatre
HOME Manchester

Offering a packed schedule of events and things to do, HOME Manchester is one of the city’s leading hubs for arts and culture.

The Hepworth Wakefield
Wakefield
Gallery
The Hepworth Wakefield

Winner of the 2017 Art Fund Museum of the Year Award, The Hepworth in Wakefield is easily one of the leading cultural highlights of the North.

The Whitworth
Manchester
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The Whitworth

This much-loved gallery-in-a-park is open for business, showcasing some of the city’s finest contemporary and historic exhibitions.

Waterfront
Museum
The British Music Experience

It’s a discotheque for the senses, an incredible collection of artefacts and memorabilia, audio guides, music and stories. There are iconic costumes worn by David Bowie, Freddie Mercury, Dusty Springfield, the Spice Girls and Adam Ant, and musical instruments played by some of the world’s most renowned artists from Noel Gallagher to the Sex Pistols.

Cumbria
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Home to 60 site specific sculptures, Grizedale Sculpture in Grizedale Forest near Hawkshead offers a pioneering and permanently evolving environmental arts and adventure programme.

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