About
Biography
Jonathan Hooper is a painter based in Leeds. He grew up in the Chilterns, and studied at Bucks College of Higher Education, Falmouth School of Art and Design, and the University of Leeds.
His subject is the built landscape of the city of Leeds, in particular the residential architecture of the suburbs to its north-west.
Statement
My twin subjects are colour, and the built landscape of Leeds.
I walk and take photographs each day. From these I explore colour and composition using watercolour on paper, before making paintings in oil. Each series of paintings has a similar colour approach and emotional atmosphere: this comes partly from the original subject and my feelings about it; but it is partly developed independently in the studio, as I evolve my pictorial ideas.
I am not trying to replicate the subject as it appears at a particular time on a particular day; but to show how it really is, how it feels, how it is in memory or imagination.
Jonathan Hooper, May 2024
Selected recent exhibitions
Solo exhibitions
Close to Home Eye Room, Leeds January - March 2024
Group exhibitions
Higher Bandwidth Village Art, Skelmanthorpe May - June 2024
Summer Show Saltaire Art Gallery May 2024 -
The Art Court Spring Exhibition First White Cloth Hall, Leeds May 2024
Beyond Colours From Life The Art Court at First White Cloth Hall, Leeds March - April 2024
Colour Fronteer Gallery, Sheffield March - April 2024
Woven Stories Sunny Bank Mills Gallery, Leeds November 2023 - February 2024
Colours From Life The Art Court at Manchester Art Fair November 2023
Prized (with Laura L Bell; Lesley Bunch; Davies, Monaghan and Klein; Louise Ventris; Jane Walkley) Old Parcels Office, Scarborough November 2023
Rising Artists (Jackson's Painting Prize exhibition) Bankside Gallery, London July 2023
Coalescence Contemporary Six, Manchester May 2023
Town and Country (with Phill Hopkins) Cole's Gallery, Leeds April - May 2023
Through the Cracks Cupola Contemporary Art, Sheffield March - April 2023
Made in Leeds Northlight Arts Centre, Leeds March - April 2023
Where We Live (with Trevor Burgess, Mandy Payne, Narbi Price, Judith Tucker) Lakeside Arts, Nottingham February - April 2023; Millennium Gallery, Sheffield January - June 2022; Alan Baxter Gallery, London October - November 2021
This must be the place Makey Wakey Spaces, Wakefield September - October 2022
Showcase Dean Clough, Halifax June - October 2021, February - April 2022
The Imagined City (with Garry Barker, Paul Digby, Howard Eaglestone, Alison Macintyre, Liz Stirling, Adam Stone) Leeds Corn Exchange October - December 2020
Positive Emotions Kunsthuis Gallery, Crayke, North Yorkshire April 2019 – January 2020
Neighbourhood Sunny Bank Mills Gallery, Leeds January – February 2018
Open exhibitions
Hampstead Art Society Summer Exhibition London 2024
New English Art Club Annual Exhibition London 2024
Royal Scottish Academy Annual Exhibition Edinburgh 2022, 2023, 2024
The Discerning Eye London 2023
Ferens Open Exhibition Hull 2012, 2014, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2023
Open Artspace 2023 Scarborough 2023
The Mercer Open Harrogate 2022
Royal Watercolour Society Open Exhibition London 2022
Royal West of England Academy Open Exhibition Bristol 2020
Royal Birmingham Society of Artists Birmingham 2019 (Open All Media Exhibition), 2020 (Prize Exhibition)
Reviews
Laura Gascoigne, 2022, 'The fascination of house fronts: Where We Live at Millennium Gallery reviewed', The Spectator, 5 February 2022.
Pamela Buxton, 2022 'Where we live: paintings of dwellings tell stories of different lives', RIBA Journal, 30 January 2022.
Maja Lorkowska, 2022, 'Where We Live at Millennium Gallery, Sheffield', creativetourist.com, 22 January 2022.
Yvette Huddleston, 2022, 'Human habitat', Yorkshire Post, 14 January 2022.
Awards
NEAC Annual Exhibition, Milner Prize for an Emerging Artist 2024
Open Call winner Partnership Editions 2023
Shortlisted for Jackson's Painting Prize 2023
Shortlisted for Yorkshire Coast D-Bid Prize 2023
Royal Watercolour Society Open Exhibition, St Cuthbert's Mill Paper Prize 2022
Royal Birmingham Society of Artists Prize Exhibition Highly Commended 2020
Interviews
Court Spencer, Snooping Through Studios, 24 November 2022
Helen Dryden, Ask the Artist, 5 May 2018