Dissent Works Exhibition
Updated: Sep 30
Running 28th September - 17th October at the Peter Scott Gallery
DISSENT WORKS brings together the work of contemporary artists from across North Lancashire to partner with selected works from the Lancaster University art collections. All respond to Lancaster Arts' 2026 annual theme of DISSENT.
Recommended Reading presents 50 books that have been banned, challenged or removed from schools in the UK and USA. Arranged like a bookshelf, the work invites viewers to browse familiar titles and confront the reality of literary censorship. It highlights growing restrictions on access to knowledge and the suppression of diverse perspectives. By exhibiting these books within a university setting, the work questions who controls information and argues that reading, inquiry and critical thinking are essential to a healthy, democratic society.
Hung to create intentional conversation between the pieces selected, and the University's extensive collection.
Recommended Reading has been paired with Willy Tirr (right) and Juilas Bissier (left). Two artists who were designated as 'Degenerate artists' by the Nazi regime. Drawing parrels between these censored books and these censored artists, and how art and culture remain defiant despite efforts by the 'powers that be'. To have been prohibited to paint, to have a book banned, is the subtle silencing of artistic presentation of uncomfortable warnings and truths.
This piece works off the dissent of educational institutions. How the mere act of reading and recommending has been censored by the state is dissension. Inquiring and expression through reading has become rebellious and challenging.
Alongside these newly selected artworks are paintings, sculptures, artifacts, digital works and other pieces drawn from the Lancaster University art collections. These collections are one of the University's most significant cultural resources, with works by artists such as Howard Hodgkin, Joan Miró, Ben Turnbull, and Winifred Nicholson. Yet collections are never fixed. They grow and change, and their meanings are continually reshaped through the conversations they create between artworks, artists and audiences.
Bringing these contemporary responses into dialogue with the collection creates unexpected connections across generations, practices and ideas. Works made in very different contexts can speak to one another, revealing shared questions on the meaning of Dissent, about identity, place, freedom and the possibility of change.
