Early insight into new Stanley Spencer show offered at curator’s talk in Marlow

Art lovers will have the chance to gain an early insight into a major new exhibition celebrating the work of Stanley Spencer at a special curator’s talk taking place in Marlow later this month.

Love and Landscape: Stanley Spencer in Suffolk is the Stanley Spencer Gallery’s major summer exhibition for 2026 and will arrive in Cookham after its initial run in Suffolk.

The exhibition is being presented in collaboration with Gainsborough’s House.

It will feature major loans from public collections, including Tate, Aberdeen Art Gallery and Leeds Museums and Galleries, alongside rarely seen works from private collections.

Ahead of the exhibition’s public opening on April 4, curator Dr Amy Lim will give an introductory talk on Thursday, February 26, at Marlow Methodist Church.

The event will run from 7pm to 8.30pm and is open to anyone interested in learning more about Spencer’s work.

Dr Lim said: "Stanley Spencer's art was rooted in both his relationships and a deep sense of place, and as well as his beloved Cookham, the county of Suffolk played an important role in his life and art.

"It was where he married his first wife Hilda Carline in 1925, and where he returned after their marriage broke down.

"This talk will tell the story of their love and artistic development through their visits to Suffolk in the 1920s and 1930s, and introduce a major exhibition, 'Love & Landscape: Stanley Spencer in Suffolk' before it opens in the heart of Cookham."

During the talk, Dr Lim will explore how Stanley Spencer’s response to the Suffolk landscape shaped some of his most personal and emotionally charged paintings.

Drawing on new research, themes of love, belief and memory will be explored through Spencer’s landscapes and figure compositions, offering fresh historical insight into a particularly compelling period of his career.

The exhibition focuses on Spencer’s time in Suffolk during the 1920s and 1930s, a formative period in both his personal life and artistic development, where he married fellow artist Hilda Carline in Wangford.

Spencer, Hilda and her brother, the artist Richard Carline, had stayed in the village the previous year, where their artistic practice and relationships developed side by side.

Curated jointly by the Stanley Spencer Gallery and Gainsborough’s House, the exhibition will focus on Spencer’s Suffolk works, including paintings created during his marriage and on his return to the area a decade later.

Organisers say it offers a rare opportunity to encounter this body of work in depth and to understand why the period remains so significant today.

Audiences will be able to discover how the landscape influenced both the emotional tone and subject matter of his art, whether they are long-time admirers or encountering his work for the first time.

The curator’s talk will conclude with a question-and-answer session, giving attendees the chance to engage directly with Dr Lim and gain a deeper understanding of the exhibition before it opens.

Love and Landscape: Stanley Spencer in Suffolk will be on display at the Stanley Spencer Gallery in Cookham until November 1.