Over the past years, I and my colleagues in the art team have made a conscious attempt to address the omissions and erasures that are inherent in public art collections like that of the Laing Art Gallery and indeed within the canon of British art itself. With a particular focus on gender, this has manifested itself in a series of exhibitions, redisplays of the permanent collection and a refocusing of our acquisitions policy. It is therefore opportune that we are able to work in partnership with Liss Llewellyn on WOW: Women Only Works on Paper. Liss Llewellyn have long made it their mission to encourage the reappraisal of some of the less well-known figures of 20th-century art ñ who more often than not are women. In particular, their impressive publications and exhibitions have brought many women artists more mainstream attention.
Liss Llewellyn have drawn together over fifty works on paper from private collections. The selection includes a wide variety of works in a range of styles and of out- standing quality. The artists Vanessa Bell, Hilda Carline, Ithell Colquhoun, Winifred Knights and Paule VÈzelay are all represented, as well as other accomplished but less well-known artists. WOW will be shown concurrently with Challenging Convention which focuses on the work of Laura Knight, Gwen John, Vanessa Bell and Dod Procter.