York Art Gallery puts spotlight on artist William Etty (From York Press)

York Art Gallery puts spotlight on artist William Etty

7:50am Friday 7th January 2011 in Exhibitions By Dan Bean, dan.bean@thepress.co.uk

THE life and works of one of Britain’s most significant and controversial artists will be explored in a major new exhibition at York Art Gallery this year.

William Etty was born in York in 1787, and a statue of him was put up in front of the city’s gallery in 1911, but his work split opinion throughout his lifetime.

The exhibition, entitled William Etty: Art And Controversy, will explore the life and career of the 19th Century painter, who was selected to the Royal Academy ahead of landscape artist John Constable.

In later years, Etty was shunned by the artistic community for his paintings of the female nude. He died in York in 1849.

Dr Sarah Burnage has spent two years working on the exhibition, She said: “Etty is without doubt one of the most significant artists of his generation.

“He was described by contemporaries as one of the finest specimens of historical talent that the English school has yet produced and revered for his skills as a colourist. Yet despite the significant acclaim he secured in the period, history has seen Etty systematically marginalised and neglected.”

The exhibition will include more than 100 works by Etty, from studies and sketches he made in life class, through to ambitious historical canvasses, and will appear alongside works loaned from Tate, the Royal Academy and Manchester Art Gallery. In the Main Gallery, visitors can view the historical and mythological works created by Etty, along with praise and criticism from newspapers and artistic journals at the time.

Another section hosting Etty’s homage to the works of other painters will also feature works from York Gallery’s Old Masters collection, which will be hung in a style similar to their presentation in the nineteenth century.

The exhibition runs from June 25 this year until January 22, 2012.