Everyday Objects

A drawing workshop with artist Lisa Milroy as part of our Night at the Gallery event.

Manchester Art Gallery is delighted to welcome artist Lisa Milroy , whose painting you can currently see in ‘Room to Breathe ’ . Lisa will deliver a special drawing workshop ‘Everyday Objects’. Through this practical workshop Lisa invites you to explore your connection to objects through drawing. You will be introduced to the role of observation, memory and mental recall in relation to drawing, and situate the familiar stuff of everyday life as a source for creative engagement. ‘Everyday Objects’ grows out of Lisa’s practice and her approach to still life painting. 

Participants are requested to bring a personal object (handheld size) to the workshop, which they will use as the basis for their drawings – the object might be a souvenir or a functional object, such as an item of clothing or accessory (wristwatch, jewellery), or tools for DIY or cooking, etc.  

The workshop is a one and half hour event that takes place in a large open space where participants should be prepared to work on the floor. Participants are advised to wear appropriate clothing for messy work - the art materials used are compressed charcoal and newsprint. 

All materials, apart from your personal object, will be provided.

About the artist

Lisa Milroy was born in Vancouver, Canada and lives and works in London and Lydd-on-Sea, Kent.

Still life is at the heart of Milroy’s practice. In the 1980s her paintings featured ordinary objects depicted against an off-white background. Subsequently her imagery expanded to include depictions of objects within settings, as well as landscape, architecture, food, people, pattern and textiles. As her approaches to still life diversified, so did her manner of painting, giving rise to a range of stylistic innovations. Throughout her practice, Milroy has been fascinated by the relation between stillness and movement, and the nature of making and looking at painting.

Milroy won First Prize in the John Moores Painting Prize 1989 and was elected to the Royal Academy of Arts in 2005. She is Professor Emerita of Fine Art at the Slade School of Fine Art, UCL and Professor of Painting at the RA Schools. Milroy was Artist Trustee of Tate from 2013-17 and Liaison Trustee to the National Gallery from 2015-17. Her work is held in many public collections, including Tate and Manchester Art Gallery, UK, Frac Occitanie Montpellier, France, Metropolitan Museum of Art, USA and Fukuoka Art Museum, Japan. Milroy is founder and Co-Director of Hands On Art Workshops, an art educational initiative operating in Kakuma Refugee Camp, Kenya with support from UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency. Milroy is represented by Kate MacGarry.