SALFORD.- Personal Feeling is the Main Thing is a major solo exhibition by Chantal Joffe, one of the most distinctive and uncompromising figurative painters working in Britain today. Following recent exhibitions in Helsinki, New York and at the Jerwood Gallery, Hastings, this is Joffe’s first solo exhibition in the North of England.

The exhibition features a new painting commissioned for Week 53, The Lowry’s biennial, cross-arts festival, shown alongside a selection of works from Joffe’s career. The festival’s theme ‘Coming of Age’ is perfectly encapsulated through Joffe’s fearless images of women and girls, which share glimpses of her own relationship with her daughter, and explore transitions into adolescence and motherhood. They confront the physicality of the human body and the complexities of human emotions in a remarkable combination of detachment, humour and intimacy.

An enduring influence on Joffe is the pioneering German painter, Paula Modersohn-Becker (1876-1907), whose work is also being featured. Modersohn-Becker was one of the first women to paint a nude self-portrait, and to go on and paint more self-portraits while she was pregnant. Challenging centuries of traditional representations of the female body in art, she paved the way for generations of women artists. However her art was also met with fierce resistance, not least from the Nazi Government in Germany, who removed her works from public museums, destroyed many and exhibited others in the infamous Degenerate Art exhibition of 1937. Seldom shown in the UK, four paintings by Modersohn-Becker, selected by Joffe from collections in Germany, will be included in this exhibition.

Personal Feeling is the Main Thing is part of Week 53, a pioneering, biennial cross-arts festival at The Lowry, the most visited cultural destination in the North West. The festival – which celebrates The Lowry turning 18 with the theme ‘Coming of Age’ – sees contemporary performance, visual arts, sound and theatre combine in interactive installations, exhibitions and plays, taking place in surprising spaces across the entire venue and beyond. Running from 17 – 28 May, Week 53 brings together more than 130 artists in over 66 performances.

Chantal Joffe RA (b. 1969) holds an MA from the Royal College of Art and was awarded the Royal Academy Wollaston Prize in 2006. Joffe has exhibited nationally and internationally at venues including the National Museum of Iceland, Reykjavík (2016); National Portrait Gallery, London (2015); Jewish Museum, New York (2015); Jerwood Gallery, Hastings (2015); Collezione Maramotti, Reggio Emilia, Italy (2014 – 2015); Saatchi Gallery, London (2013 – 2014); MODEM, Hungary (2012); Mackintosh Museum, Glasgow (2012); Il Capricorno, Venice (2011); Turner Contemporary, Margate (2011); Neuberger Museum of Art, Purchase, New York (2009); University of the Arts, London (2007); MIMA Middlesbrough Institute of Modern Art (2007); Royal Academy of Arts, London (2005); Galleri KB, Oslo (2005) and Bloomberg Space, London (2004). Joffe’s work has been featured in the recent exhibitions ISelf Collection: The End of Love at the Whitechapel Gallery, London (2017); Hope and Hazard: A Comedy of Eros, curated by Eric Fischl, at Hall Art Foundation, Reading, Vermont (2017); and in the current exhibition From Life at the Royal Academy of Arts, London (until 11 March 2018). She lives and works in London, and is represented by Victoria Miro.

Joffe will create a major new public work for the Elizabeth line station at Whitechapel. Titled A Sunday Afternoon in Whitechapel, the work will be on view when the Crossrail station opens in December 2018.