Lavery on Location

A major exhibition coming to the Ulster Museum this February, exploring the travels of Sir John Lavery (1856 to 1941), organised in collaboration with the National Gallery of Ireland and National Galleries of Scotland.

Born in Belfast, Lavery was an internationally renowned Irish painter and never travelled for business or pleasure without his painting kit. This exhibition delves into Lavery's impressions of the people and places that he encountered during a life filled with travel. Early on in his career, Lavery perfected the oil sketch as a way to capture the mood of the places he visited. Alongside larger, more finished paintings, this exhibition includes several small, quickly executed oil sketches that are among Lavery's most intimate and memorable works.

Lavery On Location explores some of the key destinations in Lavery’s art, from Morocco and Palm Springs to Lough Derg in County Donegal. The exhibition includes studies of Switzerland, France, Ireland and North Africa, as well as evocative cityscapes of Glasgow, Venice, Cannes and New York. Such was the richness and variety of Lavery's work, that Winston Churchill described his artistic mentor as a 'plein-airiste (an outdoor painter) if ever there was one' and he is the only Irishman to receive the Freedom of both Dublin and Belfast.

The exhibition includes over 70 works, many from private collections, and offers a rare opportunity to discover more about this captivating and less well-known area of Lavery’s career.