Purdy Hicks Gallery

02/09/2026

We are delighted to be opening a solo exhibition of new works by Jonathan Delafield Cook, from 11 September – 10 October.

Tania Compton once wrote of his charcoal drawings that “In the hands of Jonathan Delafield Cook a stick of carbonised willow deftly conjures the very weight and texture of the lightest of feathers.”

In this new exhibition, amongst flowers and beasts, the feather itself becomes the subject.

Feathers, 2026
Charcoal on paper, 75 × 50 cm

02/09/2026

We are delighted to be opening a solo exhibition of new works by Jonathan Delafield Cook, from 11 September – 10 October

Tania Compton once wrote of his charcoal drawings that “In the hands of Jonathan Delafield Cook a stick of carbonised willow deftly conjures the very weight and texture of the lightest of feathers.”

In this new exhibition, amongst flowers and beasts, the feather itself becomes the subject.

Feathers, 2026
Charcoal on paper, 75 × 50 cm

28/08/2026

L’intime Festival, Namur:
A photographic installation of works from Diana Matar’s Tête-à-Tête series at the Parliament of Wallonia, from 28 August to 30 September.

Made in response to the ancient sculpture collection at the National Archaeological Museum of Naples.

“The longer I spent with the collection, the more I found that, even though the sculptures were made of stone, they were alive and dynamic; that if one attended to them, they responded.” — Diana Matar

Diana Matar L’Intime Festival

22/08/2026

Susan Derges today in the Financial Times, online and in print, her works illustrating an article on the companionship of rivers that short story writer and minister Henry Van D**e explored so beautifully in Little Rivers (1896).

130 years on, Susan Derges continues his train of thought in a career of work dedicated to water, capturing the continuous movement of water by submerging photographic paper into rivers. Working at night, she uses the light of the moon and a micro-second of flash light to expose images directly onto light sensitive paper.

As Van D**e writes: “A river is the most human and companionable of all inanimate things. It has a life, a character, a voice of its own.”

Financial Times

14/08/2026

The Week features Pierre Bergian’s exhibition, Fragments of Place (Purdy Hicks Gallery to 28 August) Pierre Bergian The Week UK

13/08/2026

05/08/2026

Pierre Bergian’s Fragments of Place, at Purdy Hicks until 28 August, goes from Roman palazzi, Holkham Hall, Petworth House and Castle Howard, as well as artists’ studios and collectors’ houses. The exhibition follows Bergian’s remembered places and relics within. And as Pierre writes: “Fragments are far more compelling to imagine than what has survived time without damage.” Pierre Bergian

24/07/2026

Anaïs Tondeur – Flower Power, Les Recontres de la Photographie, Arles

Contemporary photography offers a renewed interpretation of the floral theme. Far from being purely ornamental, flowers have become a means of exploring life and experimenting with the image. Presented in the Jardin d’été, works by five international artists including Anais Tondeur, show how the floral motif continues to generate new meanings within contemporary photographic practice.

Framed by ecological, political and historical concerns, images of flowers take on a different tone. What may at first appear to be an exploration of form and colour often carries a critical undercurrent. Whether through metaphor or more direct forms of representation, these works engage with their subject while exploring what photographic images can do.

For Anaïs Tondeur, working with living matter goes hand in hand with photographic experimentation, often in environments that seem inhospitable to growth. Yet even in landscapes shaped by pollution and radioactive contamination, unexpected forms of life emerge from what anthropologist Anna Lowenhaupt Tsing calls a “third nature.”

16/07/2026

We are deeply saddened by the death of Ralph Fleck: the most wonderful artist and dear friend to the Gallery. We had the enormous pleasure and honour of working with him for over 25 years and will miss him more than words can express

Born in 1951 in Freiburg, Germany, Ralph lived and worked in Freiburg and Sóller, Mallorca. He developed a painterly language that was distinctly his own. Working with densely layered oil paint, he transformed familiar subjects into works of great presence and intensity. Whether painting the complexity of a city, the order of stacked books, a field of flowers or the changing surface of the sea, he was less interested in recording a particular place than in capturing its essential character. Every part of the canvas received the same attention, and each brushstroke retained the immediacy and vitality that became a hallmark of his work.

His commitment to painting and its possibilities never wavered. His work has been presented in museum exhibitions internationally and is represented in major public and private collections across the world.

Ralph’s first solo exhibition at Purdy Hicks Gallery took place in 1999, immediately finding collectors who remained committed to the work throughout his career. Our visits to his studio in Freiburg to select paintings for exhibitions and art fairs were among the highlights of every year, invariably accompanied by magical times in some of the finest restaurants in the Black Forest.

The vast richness of the paintings he leaves behind, together with the galleries, museums and collectors who recognised his genius, will ensure that his artistic legacy endures.

We extend our heartfelt sympathy and deepest condolences to his family.

(Ralph Fleck, photographer Georg Lukas)

09/07/2026

Jatinder Singh Durhailay, Portrait Study of Shaheed Baba Deep Singh Ji (2026)

Two new works: one in natural stone pigments and the other in the finest line watercolour on handmade wasli paper. Durhailay’s depiction of Baba Deep Singh Ji tells the story of one of Sikhism’s greatest martyrs. Despite being mortally wounded while defending the Harmandir Sahib, Sikh tradition tells that he carried his severed head in one hand and continued fighting with his sword in the other, fulfilling his vow to reach the sacred shrine before attaining martyrdom.