THE ArtSpace has kept the title simple for its latest exhibition: Ludvigsen.

Such is the relentless rise of York’s most prolific artist, the cosmologist Professor Malcolm Ludvigsen, that gallery owners Greg and Ails McGee have entrusted him with an iconic status for his solo show of landscapes, seascapes and pulchritudinous female nudes.

“We’re calling the show ‘Ludvigsen’ for a reason. He’s at a point in his career where, locally at least, his name is becoming an adjective,” says Greg, who has decided it is time to stem the flow of Ludvigsen’s artistic lava by…holding another exhibition.

Hear him out. “We’re a gallery that can offer him a harbour. There’s no need for him anymore to blunderbuss the North of England in the hope of a sale or two. How many times have we seen his work in a book shop, a café, a church? He’s in Helmsley, Scarborough, Whitby. Professionally speaking, we’d like him to cool that engine down a little.”

Greg believes the Ludvigsen show offers Malcolm a chance to “push himself as a brand a little further”. “If it’s successful, he’ll be an ArtSpace artist, so his exhibitions will be curtailed a little, certainly locally. It’s in his best interests. If the show doesn’t perform, no doubt he’ll to continue to show in every warehouse, farmhouse, henhouse, outhouse and doghouse in York, but will his brand suffer as a result? Yes, I think so, definitely.”

Malcolm’s astute sense of the commercial has led to both jealousy and a sniffy attitude among the cognoscenti, but Ails McGee stands in his corner.

“His work has always irritated certain self-appointed critics, and that’s fine, but there are plenty of reasons why we keep on coming back to Malcolm: he sells, for a start, and a lot of grumblers dislike anything popular on principle,” she says.

“He’s the Coldplay of the York art scene. His work is well produced, assured and has the courage of its convictions.

“He has a very strong work ethic and he’s very professional. He hits the target nine times out ten, he sells all over the world and his work is instantly recognisable, and that’s good enough for us.”

As for Malcolm’s own thoughts, he has decided to streamline promoting his artwork after exhibiting in London and in several American galleries. “All this was rather tiring, time consuming and, strange to say, it had very little effect on my sales of paintings,” he says. “I’ve now discovered that good Yorkshire folk aren’t at all impressed by posh London galleries and tend to buy what they like rather than what they should like.”

This is all fine by Malcolm, especially as most of his sales come from within Yorkshire and via the internet. “Over the last week, for example, I’ve had requests, via my website, www.malcolmludvigsen.org.uk, for paintings from Washington DC, Guernsey, and London,” he says.

“A Nigerian art collector has asked to buy my entire stock of paintings, provided that I first allow him to take a small commission directly from my bank account. (Fair enough, I say.) “Anyway, I’ve now decided to get out of the posh-gallery rat race – no more running up and down to London, and no more sending batches of painting off to American galleries – and concentrate on Yorkshire and the internet.”

This is where Greg and Ails come into the picture, he says. “As far as I'm concerned, ArtSpace is the best outlet for my work in York, and Greg knows my work sells well, so we’ve come to an agreement that ArtSpace will have the exclusive right to sell and promote my work in York. Hopefully this means that ArtSpace will do all the hard work and leave me free to go off painting.”

Those painting pursuits have led him to the same Wolds locations favoured by another plein-air oil painter, one David Hockney. “I’ve seen him once or twice painting but he never recognises me. He, I think, claims that plein-air painting could be the way forward in art, rather than a quaint old-fashioned pastime – and, I suppose, he could be right!” says Malcolm.

“I don’t think I’d be alone in thinking that art has lost its way and doesn’t quite know where to turn. Pickled sharks are becoming tedious and the shocking has become boring.

“A little knowledge of art history shows that this sort of thing actually happens periodically every hundred years or so in art.”

Think, he says, of the rather dull period between the renaissance and the baroque, the tedious classicism before Turner and Constable, and damping effect of the academy, both French and English, in the latter half of the 19th century.

“The way out was always to abandon the studio and to get out into nature: Caravaggio using actual real-life models, usually prostitutes, for his paintings of the Virgin Mary; Turner lashed to the mast in a raging storm; and Monet painting buttercup meadows rather than historic battle scenes,” says Malcolm.

“Perhaps it’s time to get away from sharks in vinegar, skulls of gold and unmade beds and get back to buttercup meadows – anyway I know which I prefer, whether or not it is the way of the future or not.”

• Ludvigsen runs at The ArtSpace, Tower Street, York, from tonight’s preview (7pm to 9pm) until November 17.