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A dark, black-and-white image of a bare, twisted tree standing alone in a baron landscape. The tree's surface is covered in tiny, sparkling dots, making it look frosted or digital. The sky above is very dark and cloudy.
A dark, black-and-white image of a bare, twisted tree standing alone in a baron landscape. The tree's surface is covered in tiny, sparkling dots, making it look frosted or digital. The sky above is very dark and cloudy.

Monumental

Northern Gallery for Contemporary Art x University of Sunderland Fine Art = Monumental

Monumental features artworks from the Northern Gallery for Contemporary Art collection selected by 2nd (now 3rd) year Fine Art students from University of Sunderland exhibited alongside their own artwork.

For six months in 2025, artists studying Fine Art at University of Sunderland explored the Northern Gallery for Contemporary Art collection. They identified work that related to their own art practices, and the thematic and stylistic trends which presented themselves within the collection.

Each student selected an artwork which encapsulated the ‘monumental’. Together the seven artworks examine monumental structures. Including sculptural monuments, giant vapour trails, melting Icelandic glaciers, crystallised desert landscapes, state systems, and the miner’s cage near Easington Colliery.

A colourful cartoon drawing of a park or outdoor area with houses in the background. Several children and adults are doing various activities like swinging on ropes hanging from a tree, riding a bicycle, and interacting near a stream. The bottom of the image has a thick red border with white text that says

School is not compulsory

Chad McCail

2007

Inkjet print

Selected by Lucy-May De Carteret

Chad McCail’s work explores how our institutions, social hierarchies and economic systems condition the way we relate to one another. He presents alternative ways of organising society and offers different visions for the future.

‘I think of education as propaganda, a whole set of ideas that you receive from this monocultural education process that everybody flies through. There’s a set view of the world that comes out of that, so there’s an irony. By using that easy-to-read Ladybird font, I’m suggesting that my ideas are also like that; you begin at the beginning and it’s very simple.’ – Chad McCail

A black and white image of a rocky, snow-covered mountain range and a valley. The sky above is completely solid black. The image uses negative colours, making the snow look dark in places and the dark rocks look white.

Blackout

Dan Holdsworth

2010

Lightbox photographic print

Selected by Kerry Chappell

Since 1996, English artist-photographer Dan Holdsworth has explored the extreme territories that characterise humans’ changing relationship to the natural world.

Occupying a space between documentary and the make-believe, the large-scale photographs in the Blackout series transform the elemental terrain of giant Icelandic glaciers as they melt away into a strange, futuristic landscape.

Blackout‘s awe-striking photographs appear so otherworldly, it is impossible to believe that these lunar-style landscapes actually exist. The blue of the sky comes the deep black of space while the earth appears in negative, beyond imaginable human time and space.

A dark, black-and-white image of a bare, twisted tree standing alone in a baron landscape. The tree's surface is covered in tiny, sparkling dots, making it look frosted or digital. The sky above is very dark and cloudy.

Pillars of Dawn

Kelly Richardson

2015-18

Photographic prints

Selected by Chloeanne Maddison

Kelly Richardson is a Canadian artist who has become internationally recognised since the millennium. She is one of the leading representatives of artists using digital media creatively, to craft alternative landscapes.

Over the last decade she has begun dialogues with climate scientists on both sides of the Atlantic who aim to predict various scenarios that the planet faces, both in our lifetimes and in the more distant future.

Although the still image here is seen in two dimensions, it was created as a 3D model in virtual space. ‘Sculpting’ every branch of the tree and populating the entire landscape are millions of individualised crystals. There is one crystal in each of the landscapes for every species still alive today.

A silver-toned abstract sculpture stands in the center of a gallery space. Its surface appears textured and uneven, resembling a combination of organic and geological forms. The sculpture has a wide, tapering base and rises into a twisting, irregular shape with subtle facial-like impressions and protrusions. The background includes framed, colorful artworks displayed on the walls, with a polished concrete floor completing the modern gallery setting.

The Artist, His Father and His Son

Daniel Silver

2011

Aluminium

Selected by Rupa BK

Daniel Silver’s sculptures explore how Western and African sculptors have depicted human beings over the ages. He bases his work on memories from his childhood in Europe, Israel and the African Continent (South Africa and Zimbabwe).

The sculpture series Letting Go has references to Greco-Roman statues that he saw while in Athens. ‘The Artist, His Father and His Son’, an aluminium sculpture measuring almost three metres, is the central piece in this series.

It is modelled on a classical masterpiece in the Acropolis Museum. In creating these works, Silver has strived to physically and mentally lose control, prepared for success or complete failure.

A tall, dark metal cage structure stands on a grassy hill overlooking the sea at dusk. The cage is made of metal sheets and bars. There are small lights visible far out on the water and along the coastline in the distance. The grass in the foreground is long and brown.

The cage near the site where the Easington Colliery once stood. This is the metal box that transported miners into the bowels of the earth and is now a memorial to the mine that gave the village its name. Easington Colliery, County Durham.

Mark Pinder

2020

Inkjet print

Selected by Megan Hart

Mark Pinder is a documentary and editorial photographer based in the North East of England. Pinder’s photographic archives cover British social and political life since 1986. They tell the story of the overwhelming transformation in Britain since 1979 when Margaret Thatcher came to power.

There is a strong emphasis on the North East of England which has been particularly hard hit by the destruction of the industrial working class and their communities. Many of the photographs point towards the anger and resentment felt at the betrayals of a remote political class, whilst also portraying a deep affection for his home region.

A photo of a deep blue sky with three thick white aeroplane contrails crossing in the shape of a letter A. A small dark tree shape is visible on the far left. The image is darkened to the right hand side and small defects suggesting a hand developed photograph rather than a digital one.

Anarchy Sky

Vinca Petersen

2000

Digital photograph printed on fabric

Selected by Steviee Brookes

Vinca Petersen is a photographer and multidisciplinary artist based in Isle of Skye. Petersen began regularly recording her life as part of the free party and traveller community, who moved around Europe staging raves during the 1990s.

‘My way of dealing with the world is to make fun, to play. So, I would always dress up to go to demos, I’d pinch policemen’s bums and have fun in those situations. People don’t have that much fun anymore. Young people are so grown-up in the way they behave now and young women especially don’t seem to have many choices. So, I’m trying to capture a sense of joy in these pictures. It’s about making life fun despite its hardships. It’s about subversive joy.’ – Vinca Petersen

A black and white photo of a large stone statue of a naked human figure standing in a public space. The statue has a cloak draped over one shoulder. It is seen from behind. In the background is a large white brutalist-style building with many windows and a row of similar statues in different poses.

Untitled
From the series Romanitas

John Kippin

2013-16

Photographic print

Selected by Bog Heartsease

John Kippin is a central figure in the emergence of photography as an independent artform in the UK from 1970s and 1980s through to the present day.

John Kippin’s Romanitas series, made in the EUR (Esposizione Universale Roma) district of Rome, explores the architectural legacy of Benito Mussolini’s fascist project. The series title refers to the term coined in the third century, signifying the cultural identity, spirit and ideals of the Roman civilisation.

‘Buildings embody ideological aims and reflect the value systems of those with the power to plan. They are key cultural and political indicators of their time’ – John Kippin

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