The Tides are Turning: Making Waves at York Art Gallery

Notes: This review is a continuation of my critique of York Art Gallery during my undergraduate degree at the University of York. To see more, please visit "York Art Gallery Audit".
For a downloadable PDF copy, please see the JSSM PDF Archive. © 2026 Jacob Stuart Smith. All rights reserved. 

By Jacob Smith
BA(Hons) Curating & Art History

17th June 2026

Introduction
During my time as a curatorial student at the University of York, York Art Gallery (YAG) served as a frequent case study in my modules. This led me to write numerous essays assessing the institution's practices and its management of a significant historic collection. Specifically, for a module named ‘Journeys, Histories, and Methods of Display’, I wrote in depth on how the gallery suffered from an identity crisis by juxtaposing Victorian grandeur with a white box aesthetic. While I stand by my previous views on those display methods, it seems the tides are turning, and that the York Museums Trust is transitioning the gallery from a regional white box into a world-class exhibition space.

The White Box
When I started my degree at the University of York in 2022, YAG was only seven years post-transformation. In 2015, the gallery underwent an £8 million renovation to create its mezzanine level and reveal the second-floor gallery space, aiming to establish a ‘sculptural’ canvas for exhibitions. Yet, while the structural renovations were magnificent, they left many of the building’s Victorian features and the historic artworks within them feeling marooned in a sea of white.

At the time, York Art Gallery functioned primarily as a regional space holding an extensive collection heavily rooted in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. During my first year, William Etty and Gwen John typified this. I vividly recall visiting the gallery with my tutor and thinking how out of place these pieces looked hung in a rigid, straight line against a stark white wall. This disconnect was especially jarring when viewing Gwen John’s Young Woman in a Red Shawl (c. 1917–1923); at just 45.1 x 34.9 cm, the intimate portrait felt swallowed by its surroundings.

This white box phenomenon is far from unique to York. Many institutions housed in historic buildings choose to present classical or period grandeur against a backdrop explicitly designed for modern art, creating a juxtaposition that often detracts from the artwork’s original intent. A similar misstep caught my eye during a recent visit to the Walker Art Gallery (WAG) in Liverpool. While the WAG boasts several splendid, period-appropriate displays, I found myself thoroughly distracted by a piece by William Morris that had been confined within a literal white box built inside the historic gallery space (see Figure 1).

It is against the backdrop of these past display choices that I look at the Making Waves exhibition, tracking how evolving curatorial practices are transforming a regional institution into a global destination for world-class art history.

Paid-for Exhibitions?

Making Waves: The Art of Japanese Woodblock Print, on display at York Art Gallery from 27th February to 30th August 2026, is a genuine masterpiece in curatorial evolution. Curated by Eleanor Jackson and consulted on by my peer Helena Cox, among others, Making Waves demonstrates precisely how an institution can transform itself from a regional art gallery into a world-class venue capable of hosting international exhibitions.

The evolution of York Art Gallery since its transition to a paid-for model is significant for many reasons, but most notably for its use of the integrated ground-floor exhibition space, which was previously underutilised. With the introduction of major exhibitions such as Making Waves: The Art of Japanese Woodblock Print, The Art of Wallpaper: Morris & Co., and National Treasures: Monet in York ‘The Lily Pond’, the gallery has successfully repositioned its ground-floor footprint as a dynamic canvas for global art history.

This shift from a purely local focus to travelling masterpieces has brought life back to YAG. By anchoring its programming in recognisable works of art, the gallery has established a tested, sustainable framework that matches its curatorial ambition. Although I was initially dubious about the transition to a paid admission model, I now see that it was not just an operational necessity. It was the very catalyst that forced a once architecturally confused space to elevate itself onto the international stage.

To judge this exhibition in a vacuum, however, would be a disservice to its place in the remarkable transformation of YAG over the past four years. Looking at the exhibition operationally, there are distinct highlights in how the gallery is run that heavily influence the visitor experience.

Firstly, the new admissions process, which many residents were understandably hesitant about, must be applauded. Unlike other high-end exhibition centres, YAG has introduced its paid-for admission with a democratic approach to accessing art. Upon entering, it is clear that a great number of concession prices are available to cover reduced entry for groups such as seniors or students. The gallery even offers free entry for those on means-tested benefits, allowing people of all backgrounds to access these world-class artworks.

Furthermore, the gallery has continued to support the wider arts and heritage sectors by providing complimentary tickets to local initiatives, like the Northern Museum Development Volunteer pass scheme. They have also opted into national initiatives such as the National Art Pass. This inclusive gesture is particularly notable given that Art Fund schemes are not accepted at other venues within the York Museums Trust’s portfolio.

Additionally, with the increased use of the ground-floor exhibition space, the building can now provide complete step-free access to these blockbuster exhibitions, bypassing the limitations of the upper galleries, which require a lift for disabled access. This removal of physical barriers only serves to add to the democratic atmosphere of the new YAG, ensuring more people than ever can access art in York. This development is particularly poignant for me. I have previously visited the building with a friend of reduced mobility who was unable to access the upper galleries because the lift was out of order.

Making Waves

What makes this current iteration of YAG’s blockbuster programming particularly special is its relationship to the institution's own holdings. Rather than relying entirely on external touring assets, Making Waves serves as a vehicle to showcase the extensive, high-status print collection cared for directly by the gallery, seamlessly blending internal treasures with major loans.

Even with so many of the works on display coming from the gallery's own collection, many visitors will only have heard of the showstopper piece: Katsushika Hokusai’s The Great Wave off Kanagawa, which forms the basis of the exhibition's branding.

In lesser hands, an exhibition of this scale featuring an original copy of The Great Wave might have devolved into a game of ‘Japan’s Greatest Hits’, oversubscribing to well-known artworks to satisfy the appetite of paying guests. However, instead of relying solely on predictable blockbusters, Jackson’s curation opts for a tastefully disciplined and immersive rhythm. Spanning a generous sequence of rooms, the exhibition provides a deliberate progression through prints, artists, and eras, rather than the frantic art-historical dash common at many regional museums.

For many institutions, securing a loan of such significance might lead to an isolationist display, shielding the artwork behind inches of bulletproof glass, velvet ropes, and security guards akin to the Mona Lisa (see Figure 2). York Art Gallery instead offers a refreshing level of curatorial humility, presenting Hokusai as an equal rather than an isolated curiosity. Combined with a rich, deep indigo colour palette and a careful lighting arrangement, the exhibition positions itself among the high-end, sophisticated displays one would expect from an institution like the Tate, rather than a regional, charity-run art gallery. 

The Art of Japanese Woodblock Print
The viewer’s immersion into the exhibit is clear once you enter. Immediately, you are greeted by a sophisticated informational display on the basics of printing, the materials and methods used, and the cultural context of woodblock prints in Japan (see Figure 3). By providing this educational grounding before presenting the delicately beautiful prints, the exhibition allows the viewer to frame their expectations within the practical realities of the craft.

Separated into five distinct gallery spaces, the exhibition takes viewers on a journey through print, costume, and modern media. Rather than relying solely on famous artworks to carry the show, the curation highlights stories presented through ink.

In the first room, the exhibition deliberately avoids starting with The Great Wave or a wall of traditional masterpieces. Instead, the focus is on women, specifically concubines, courtesans, and sex workers, presenting an unsanitised view into the Edo period.

Moving on, two elaborate kimonos are presented on plinths at the centre of the second room (see Figure 4). From a critical standpoint, the inclusion of historic textiles in a print exhibition could easily have been seen as a form of curatorial essentialism, an institutional shorthand that might have led the exhibition down a path of orientalism over art history. However, the inclusion of these pieces within Making Waves works beautifully to provide an essence of movement, texture, and warmth to an exhibition focused on an inherently two-dimensional art form. By breaking up the flat woodblock prints with fine textiles, the curatorial team has created a sense of atmospheric depth that encourages the viewer to break from the standard 'walk around the walls' routine of a museum visit and truly engage with the space.

In the third and largest room, we encounter the showstopper of the collection, Katsushika Hokusai’s The Great Wave off Kanagawa, yet a casual viewer could easily walk straight past without realising it (see Figure 5). As mentioned, the exhibition tactfully chooses to present Hokusai simply as one of many artists, rather than a singular master to be adored. This democratisation allows the piece to speak for itself as you admire its simple beauty alongside works by Hiroshige and his contemporaries. This thoughtful placement is a testament to the space that YAG has evolved into; the fact that such a renowned artwork is presented as an equal shows that the gallery no longer feels it must rely on commercial hype, such as in the previous Monet in York campaign, but can instead trust curatorial talent to bring the success it deserves.

In the final two rooms, the exhibition shows how woodblock printing has evolved, moving beyond traditional boundaries and expanding into modern media interpretations. The journey concludes by circling back to its opening educational tenets, presenting visitors with the tactile opportunity to create an ink stamp print of Hokusai’s Wave to take away as a personal memento (see Figure 6). This interactive closure serves as a brilliant poetic loop: it rewards the viewer's newly acquired understanding of print layering and material limits, leaving them with a physical token of a highly democratic curatorial vision.

Ambition vs. Reality

In this piece, I have commended York Art Gallery for its continuing development and commitment to visitor experience. From democratic pricing structures to level access and even the provision of sensory packs, YAG has become a model of modern curatorial practice. However, my experience has shown that paint and masterpieces are not all that is needed to make an exhibition truly successful, and, ironically, it may be the building’s Victorian past that is again causing trouble for its newfound prowess.

Where the exhibition fails is not in its curation, nor its contemporary appearance, but in its attempts to provide contemporary infrastructure. York Art Gallery inhabits a building which was originally constructed in 1879 to house the second Yorkshire Fine Art and Industrial Exhibition . A Grade II listed building since July 1968, the Victorian grandeur of the structure was never expected to house exhibitions reliant on technology. However, the presentation of fine art has drastically changed in the 147 years since its construction .

In Making Waves, York Art Gallery has seemingly leaned heavily into contemporary digital engagement, launching an integrated audio guide for visitors to the exhibition (see Figure 7) . Intellectually, the guide is faultless: it integrates features such as authentic localised voice acting and an intuitive self-playing feature, and it is highly organised. Accessible integrations, such as audio guides, are essential in modern museums, and I am happy to see YAG embracing such assistive technologies. However, as this particular audio guide is a web-hosted iteration accessed by visitors' personal devices rather than the more traditional handheld versions, there are some difficulties that appeared during my testing.

The major issue with the exhibition audio guide carries a sense of delicious irony, in that it is the very Victorian building that once left visitors architecturally lost that is hindering contemporary viewers from following the guide. As the audio guide is little more than a website to access MP3 files hosted by YAG, the fact that there is no provided Wi-Fi and little cellular coverage in the exhibition space made the guide utterly unusable by the third exhibition space, critically, the room which hosts the centrepiece of the entire show.

During my second visit to the exhibition, I chose to test the audio guide, which was vaguely advertised by QR codes around the rooms. Luckily, I had brought a pair of headphones with me, as this required me to use my phone to access the guide. Once set up, I found the experience awkwardly isolating; I was seemingly the only visitor using the audio guide on my visit, and I found that I had several people shuffle around me as I stood in front of each artwork listening to its description. As someone with learning disabilities, I found the guide incredibly helpful, although, as I only had access to part of the exhibition, I quickly felt this feeling of empowerment fade away.

The fact that an audio guide that relies on internet access to provide a vital accessibility feature was put in place without the provision of appropriate connectivity shows a major disconnect between the curatorial and facilities management teams at YAG. When I mentioned this disconnect to a peer who works within the York Museums Trust, I was informed that it was a known problem, and that staff were also unable to access the internet within the building. For an institution which has so many accessibility pros and is attempting to present itself as a world-class institution alongside major players, this failure to stress-test basic internet connectivity before rollout shows a glaring oversight for multiple teams within YAG.

The Turning Tides

Despite the technological pitfalls of the new and improved York Art Gallery and its organisational growing pains, it is safe to say that the tides have well and truly turned for the better since 2022. The new standard of curatorial confidence has transformed the once sterile environment into a cultural masterclass for regional museums. With even the upper-gallery spaces having undergone a long-needed transformation to incorporate a salon-style hang, it is clear that YAG has evolved, and Making Waves is proof of it.

When any gallery transitions from free admission to a paid-for model, there is inevitably going to be scepticism, but the result of YAG's transformation is a space that is no longer an architecturally confused regional box. Instead, it has become a venue worthy of global residents.

Through the Making Waves exhibition, the gallery and its dedicated team have proved that they can successfully navigate a transition in curatorial practice, commercial mechanics, and world-class loans to construct a sophisticated blueprint for regional museums and galleries in Britain to follow. With its upcoming rotation of exhibitions, I hope that the practicalities of the Victorian building can catch up with the strides being taken by the curatorial team at YAG. In doing so, it can fulfil the legacy laid down by its founders 147 years ago, choosing not simply to house art, but to be a beacon for its discovery.

References:

‘Audio Guide Player’. Accessed 16 June 2026. https://audio.yorkmuseumstrust.org.uk/?guide=7mbw8qpm29c661z&chapter=7bas78bws8bln29.

Ijeh, Ike. ‘York Art Gallery: Show Time’. Building, July 2015. 

https://www.building.co.uk/focus/york-art-gallery-show-time/5076607.article.

‘Listed Building - CITY ART GALLERY - York Historic Environment Record’. Accessed 16 June 2026. https://her.york.gov.uk/Designation/DYO1148.

‘York Art Gallery | York Museums Trust’. Accessed 16 June 2026. https://www.yorkmuseumstrust.org.uk/about-us/our-venues/york-art-gallery/.

‘York Art Gallery: History of York’. Accessed 16 June 2026. https://www.historyofyork.org.uk/themes/victorian/york-art-gallery.

‘Young Woman in a Red Shawl | Art UK’. Accessed 26 April 2026. https://artuk.org/discover/artworks/young-woman-in-a-red-shawl-8110.

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