Image: Hepworth Wakefield
The Hepworth Wakefield will host an artist talk with Lewis Hammond on 11 July, bringing together the painter and exhibition curator Marie-Charlotte Carrier to discuss Hammond’s first museum presentation in the UK, Crystal in the Shade. The event is scheduled for 2pm at the Wakefield museum and forms part of the gallery’s summer programme around the exhibition, which features a new body of paintings developed specifically for the venue.
The talk is framed not simply as a public conversation but as an opportunity to unpack the ideas behind Hammond’s work at a significant moment in his career. According to the gallery, the discussion will focus on his painting process, including his use of oil paint and layered surfaces, as well as the mythological and contemporary references that shape the works. The themes of home, displacement and belonging, which the institution identifies as central to the exhibition, will also be explored.
Crystal in the Shade is on display at The Hepworth Wakefield from 23 May to 1 November 2026. The gallery describes the project as Hammond’s first museum presentation in the UK, making the exhibition a notable point of visibility for an artist whose work is being shown in a museum context for the first time in his home country. In a summer season that also includes other major displays at the West Yorkshire museum, the show adds a contemporary painting focus to a programme that spans sculpture, collection displays and wider cultural events.
The artist talk will also mark the launch of a new publication, Lewis Hammond: Crystal in the Shade, published by The Hepworth Wakefield and edited by Carrier. The book includes writing by Julia Hori, Kayo Chingonyi and Helen Turner, extending the exhibition beyond the gallery walls and into a critical, printed format. The museum’s event listing notes that the publication is part of the occasion, underlining the institution’s interest in pairing exhibition-making with scholarly and literary commentary.
The Hepworth Wakefield’s announcement places Hammond’s work within a broader curatorial context that connects contemporary painting to enduring art-historical sources. The gallery’s newsletter says Hammond takes inspiration from “the classics – Caravaggio, Velázquez, Goya” to create “old master-inspired, mythological paintings of modern anxieties.” That linkage helps explain why the museum is positioning the event as more than a standard artist talk: it is a chance to examine how historical painting languages can be reworked to address present-day conditions.
The event also reflects the museum’s wider effort to make its exhibition programme active and public-facing through talks, garden events and publications. Alongside Crystal in the Shade, The Hepworth Wakefield’s summer calendar includes other exhibitions and activities, but Hammond’s talk stands out as a direct conversation with an artist whose museum debut has been tailored to the site. For visitors and the wider art world, the combination of first-time museum exposure, critical discussion and a new publication gives the project a significance that reaches beyond Wakefield itself.
