IMAGINE a new motorway to be constructed across the North York Moors, linking Thirsk with Whitby? Wolds artist Ian Mitchell considers this possible scenario in his teasing exhibition, A1(M) Eastern Gateway, in The Gallery at Ryedale Folk Museum, Hutton-le-Hole.

To prepare the ground, Ian had fun posting spoof planning notices around the area in an attempt to intrigue the locals.

The resulting imaginary motorway can be viewed until July 8. “In these new works the aesthetics of modernity collide with traditional conventions of the picturesque through a series of digital prints that visualise a motorway through the North York Moors National Park,” says Ian, whose images are realised as digital prints on experimental surfaces.

“I’ve worked digitally to reduce the landscape, conjuring up new ones, printing on to metallic and vinyl surfaces and having metal cut into shapes.”

A grant awarded from the National Lottery through Arts Council England has enabled Ian to research and acquire new materials and techniques to produce these new, larger works.

“The grant has given me the opportunity to create more experimental work that’s a development away from my more familiar Yorkshire landscape work, which references the British travel posters of the 1920s,” he says.

“It’s also enabled me to put a publication together, which I’ve designed and has an essay by author Harriet Vyner.”

When Ian is not busy creating art from his home in the Wolds, he can be found manning the Duckett & Jeffreys Gallery in Malton, which he set up with his wife, Stef, two years ago.