YORK gallery According To McGee is veering away from the cutting edge to celebrating "art that our grandparents would have enjoyed" in its duo show by Richard Gray and Malcolm Ludvigsen.

"We thought, 'let's relax the contemporary vibe for a brief while and let's see how the gallery works as a trendy, white cube space showcasing traditional, representational painting'," says co-director Greg McGee, introducing York: The Urban And The Rural, which opens on Saturday.

Oil artist Richard, who studied at Goldsmiths College, paints generally representational work. "In this latest series, the paintings are a response to the light, shade and elegant excitement of cities such as York and Paris," he says.

Greg describes Richard as a "highly skilled realist who can skewer the shifting in light better than pretty much anyone else on the scene at the moment". "Our flagship piece is his Paris: February cityscape, but his depictions of the streets of York in the evening are just as thrilling," he says. "York has so much to offer in terms of coiled energy and elegant beauty beneath the baroque bombast. Richard takes a view finder of that and nails it."

Welcoming the return of the prolific Professor Ludvigsen to the McGee walls after a hiatus, co-director Ails McGee says: "We haven't worked with Malcolm in a long time. It's no secret that his ubiquitousness can diffuse the impact of much of his painting, and so we all agreed that his work for this show would be an exclusive series of his most recent seascapes and landscapes.

"At his best, he's the real deal, and his work has his name written all over it. He has his detractors, but he has a growing list of collectors from all over the world, and he's gaining critical recognition. Receiving a national award, the Oldie British Art Award, has given his reputation a much deserved boost."

Malcolm says: "It's great to be back at According to McGee. I've been increasingly selling to international collectors, especially in the USA, so it's a kind of homecoming to be back selling opposite York's Clifford's Tower."

Greg sees a link between the Gray & Ludvigsen show and graduate exhibitions at the McGee gallery. "After a long series of edgy exhibitions, I have to say it's refreshing to celebrate art that our grandparents would have enjoyed, but there no judgement call on that, by the way," he says. "The idea that just because a piece is contemporary means it can't include traditional elements is limiting and reductive, and we've been gratified to see that the most successful wave of new graduates from Goldsmiths and Glasgow with whom we've worked have paid homage to art that would have looked cool on Grandad's wall."

The exhibition will be launched with a private view from 1pm to 4pm on Saturday and will run until April 26. All work will be for sale.