Romance to Realities: The Northern Landscape and Shifting Identities

Admission charges apply: 

Free for Max Card holders, members of NMDC and Museums Association, and exhibition lenders.  

*Concessions include senior citizens (65+), students, registered unemployed people, disabled people (plus free entry for one carer). 

**Membership discount applies to Friends of the Laing and Art Fund members. 

To be eligible for discounts you must show proof of age/status/membership 

Purchase your tickets on the day, no need to pre-book. 

A new exhibition at the Laing Art Gallery explores over 200 years of landscape painting in the North of England and Scotland, focusing on the diverse and dramatic landscapes of the regions and how artists have depicted not only the world around us, but also our place within it.   

For centuries, the landscapes of the North have fascinated artists and this exhibition will focus on how these landscapes —urban, rural, land, sea, and sky— have changed. From the Romanticised visions of early artists to the more complex and sometimes harsh realities captured in later works, the paintings reveal not just the physical changes in the land, but also shifts in societal values and human experience.  

The exhibition charts thematic changes in landscape painting. It explores the idea of landscape as 'sublime,' awe-inspiring and overwhelming, and idealised or ‘picturesque,’ which was tied to notions of national identity. Some of the works examine the realities and everyday details of landscapes shaped by agriculture, industry, and urbanisation in later periods, including figures of labourers working in fields, quarries, and mines. It also explores the displacement of communities, the migration to urban centres, and the enduring connection between people and their surroundings, including conceptions of place and belonging.  

The exhibition invites visitors to reflect on the past, understand the present, and consider the future of these ever-changing landscapes.

Romance to Realities: The Northern Landscape and Shifting Identities includes works by early pioneers of British landscape art such as John Knox, Alexander Nasmyth, and John Martin through to modern and contemporary works by Anne Redpath, L.S. Lowry, and Joan Eardley.  

This exhibition is organised in collaboration with The Fleming Collection and will bring together works from what is considered the finest collection of Scottish art outside public institutions with paintings from the Laing's outstanding permanent collection.