Rise of the Cities charts the decisive shift of power from countryside to the city during the 19th century. With the industrial revolution transforming the British Isles, a divide opened up between city and country, forcing artists to respond to the upheaval to lives and the landscape. Icelandic artist Olafur Eliasson reflects on the inspiration of JMW Turner, arguably the first environmental artist, and we encounter Penry Williams' attempt to capture the beauty of industry with paintings like Cyfarthfa Ironworks Interior at Night.
Some artists attempt to capture the poverty and squalor caused by the rapid urbanisation around them. Actress Maxine Peake reads from Elizabeth Gaskell's campaigning novel North and South while architect Fiona Sinclair assesses Alexander ‘Greek' Thomson's architecture for the people of Glasgow and artist Jeremy Deller explores William Morris' drive to bring nature back into Victorian homes through his hand-crafted wallpaper designs.
As art becomes appropriated by commerce in the late 19th century, some artists fight back with new individuality and flair. Writer and drag performer Amrou Al-Kadhi explores the meaning and inspiration of Oscar Wilde's writing and artist Shani Rhys James reflects on the quiet anger that simmers underneath Walter Sickert's Camden Town Nudes, an unflinching vision of the grimy realities of working class lives at the turn of the 20th century.
