ANDY Fullalove is filling the According To McGee gallery with his paintings once more in Risen, his resurgent first York show in three years.

"This award-winning Holmfirth painter is the perfect artist to spearhead our revived Return of the Artist campaign," says gallery director Greg McGee. "Andy has come back with a collection that builds on and diversifies his legacy. He always was a fearless painter when it came to colour and texture, but he's really gone for it this time and has scaled new heights.

"Pushing paint around with showmanship and swagger is one thing, but to stir the viewers' emotions like this, to provide a transcendental experience with nothing more than a paint brush and a canvas, that takes the touch of a shaman."

Such strong praise is merited, suggests Greg. "Increasingly video installations and conceptual performances are taking up all the oxygen in the world of Yorkshire exhibition experiences, but we've always championed painting from excellent contemporary painters.

"We see no reason why it shouldn't receive the metropolitan attention its more notorious cousins enjoy, such as the puzzling concept installations now beloved of graduates and critics," he says.

"Fullalove's work is just as edgy and relevant as any of that; it's just that it's been produced with craft and dedication, which is often the case with painters. For Fullalove, painting is a vocation, as it is for other serious painters in the North, and I'd just urge the decision makers behind the likes of York's Mediale festival and Hull's City of Culture exhibitions that painters like him and art like this needs to be celebrated."

Andy Fullalove, the recipient of last year's Art Market award for Outstanding Artist, is delighted to be presenting his artistic resurrection from darkness to light at the Tower Street gallery. "It's so good to get such positive feedback from the people of York, and the show works particularly well at According To McGee," he says.

"I've always painted from a deep emotional state, and this exhibition is no exception. However, it's fair to say that this body of work in particular has taken me on a journey from despair to hope. I'm so proud of these paintings; I feel I've produced some of my best work to date."

Gallery co-director Ails McGee is especially taken by the show's emotional content. "Andy is not the kind of artist who paints what he'd like to see or what he thinks his collectors would like to see. He's obviously been through some dark times and is able to capture that in his landscapes and seascapes, and in a sense he is, like all great artists, obliged to tell the world of the redemptive power of creativity," she says.

"I'd urge anyone who has ever been through a tough time to come and peruse this collection. Andy has been there and come back, and he's stronger for it, his art is better for it, and I can't think of a better way of capturing that feeling of hope than looking at the title of the show, 'Risen'. It's a beautiful collection, and an important collection. It's always good to be reminded that top-quality painting can do so much more than decorate a room."

Greg is pleased with how the Fullalove show has been received over its opening days. "It was a busy private view last Saturday with plenty of sales, and both we and Andy were delighted with the feedback from browsers and collectors alike," he says.

"Sometimes in the creative industries, it's good to be reminded by the quality of a certain show and how the public appreciates that it is OK, after all, to stick to your guns. We're a contemporary gallery that champions challenging, contemporary painting. Both Ails and myself were told years ago that painting as a medium is dead. Well, I'm happy to report that the rumours of painting's demise have been greatly exaggerated. Few people can hammer that home better than Andy Fullalove."