By Paul Abraham (www.paulabraham.info)
Friday, 15 August was a significant day for the ever-innovative Mill Gallery as they launched “The People’s Gallery” – a new free space dedicated to accessible, inclusive and community-led creativity.
The evening proved to be a massive success as it brought a broad range of ages who soaked up the intoxicating works of art from a diverse collection of artistic styles. Each piece delivered a powerful story.
The first-night attendees were treated to the collection titled “Gestures”, the debut exhibition from the Resilient Artist Cohort: six Leeds-based artists embarking on a year-long journey of artistic growth and collaboration.
Check out the slideshow of photos from the event below:
This live, evolving show explores how movement, mark-making, and intention shape creative practice.
From emotionally layered landscapes and vibrant strokes alive with energy, to abstract compositions rooted in memory and heritage, Gesture invites you into a space where process and possibility meet. It’s an open-ended experiment — and just the beginning.
The first exhibition in the Peoples Gallery is the amazing and thought-provoking “Protest & Pride” which is a celebration of LGBTQIA+ creativity, protest and radical joy. This powerful show brings together artists using their work to speak up, resist, and connect, from political movements to personal acts of defiance.
The exhibition is about anger and celebration, resilience and visibility because art can be protest, and joy can be resistance too.
It runs alongside the Mill Gallery’s workshop “Art of Protest: Creative Solidarity with the Trans Community”, and together they open a new chapter in the venue’s mission to make art more accessible, inclusive, and shaped by the local community.
The exhibition runs from 15 August until 5 September at Swinnow Grange Mills, off Stanningley Road, and shows again what an important role the gallery is in providing in promoting art in all its forms to the West Leeds community.
The People’s Gallery space is funded by the Postcode Lottery.
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