David Cox and his Contemporaries

About

This exhibition will explore the work of one of the West Midland's greatest artists, David Cox, as well as the artists who influenced him, the people who collected his work and how his painting and teaching shaped the art world around him.

During the last two decades of his life Cox experimented with oil paint, colour and different kinds of paper, creating the breathtaking landscape artworks that he has become best known for. In the 21st century, Cox is widely considered as one of Britain's best water colourists and has even been named as a precursor to the impressionist movement.

David Cox and his Contemporaries will explore Cox's work, the artists who influenced him and the influence his own work and writing had on watercolour painting, landscape art and the vibrant artistic communities of the Midlands in the nineteenth-century.

Bringing together paintings from local and national museums, as well as Worcester's own collection that are rarely put on public display due to their fragile nature, this exhibition will offer a unique opportunity to see a large body of David Cox's work and the unique chance to see Cox's work next to the painters that influenced him and to explore his own influence on British art.

Bringing the exhibition into the 21st century, part of the watercolour gallery will be dedicated to recent graduate work selected for New Art West Midlands 2017. The celebration of the best graduate art in the West Midlands will demonstrate the Midland's long history of art, from creating to collecting it.