Oceans Apart Gallery

Oceans Apart is an artist-led gallery located in an industrial building in Salford, with an inviting exhibition space hidden behind a shutter on Salford’s King Street.

It’s dedicated to showcasing the breadth of contemporary painting, while critically engaging with today’s art discourse.

The gallery itself is a well lit space that usually showcases painting in a traditional manner, with mostly two-dimensional works hanging on white walls. It’s a tried and tested format, and one that often works best for painting (no matter how experimental or unusual) giving each piece the space to breathe.

Oceans Apart works to bring previously unseen painting to the North West to diversify local perspectives on what painting can be. Contemporary painters aren’t bound by oil paint and canvas, but instead venture out into new territories, experimenting with surfaces, mark-making and formats and the gallery celebrates this variety of approaches. Exhibitions are often organised based on specific themes, which makes for interesting groupings of work – a testament to the gallery’s commitment to well curated, conceptually rich shows.

The gallery will also become a key site in the Turps | Manchester Programme in early 2026, holding group crits in the intense one-year mentoring programme for painters who work in Manchester.

Oceans Apart exhibitions are open to all and change on an irregular basis. Keep an eye out on their social media pages for upcoming event announcements.