Manchester Art Gallery

Events | Book a space to get things done | Exhibiting artists

Get Together and Get Things Done is part of a city-wide programme in 2019 to commemorate the bicentenary of the Peterloo Massacre.

On 16 August 1819, in a period of wide-scale protest and unrest, the area around what is now St Peter’s Square, Manchester was the site of a violent assault on 60,000+ peaceful pro-democracy and anti-poverty protesters; now known as the Peterloo Massacre. Historians acknowledge that Peterloo was hugely influential: ordinary people eventually won the right to vote, the Chartist Movement grew into Trade Unions and the Manchester Guardian newspaper was established.

Inspired by these events, we will explore with people the wider theme of the crowd through international historic and contemporary art and group activity, looking at how an art gallery can be shaped by the crowds that use them.

Would you like to get together and get things done?

If you’d like to get together and get things done, we have spaces and resources free for non profit groups. We are especially interested in supporting people who are looking to make Manchester a better place to live work and play. There are two spaces available – Studio 1 (ground floor) and the Exhibition Gallery 17 (second floor). Both spaces can accommodate up to 30 people for talks and meetings. There are no AV facilities in either space. The spaces are available 7 days per week – excluding Monday morning – with one week’s notice, and are bookable for a morning or afternoon slot. We have an open door policy for the use of these spaces. This means activities can be accessed by all visitors to the gallery. If the open door ethos is not appropriate for your gathering, please use the space in the booking form to highlight the reasons why you want your activity to be private. These spaces can be booked using the form below.

Available spaces

Getting things done – event programme

Book a space

Exhibiting artists

Atelier Populaire (The People’s Workshop) | Wilhelmina Barns-Graham | Walter Bayes | Black Audio Film Collective (John Akomfrah, Reece Auguiste, Edward George, Lina Gopaul, Avril Johnson, David Lawson, Trevor Mathis) | Sonia Boyce | Christina Broom | Edward Burra | Sheba Chhachhi | George Cruikshank | Isaac Cruikshank | Charles Cundall | Thomas Cantrell Dugdale | Georg Eisler | Sylvia Gosse | Francisco Goya Y Lucientes | William Powell Frith | Rokni Haerizadeh | Louis Haghe | Keeley Halswelle | Ellie Harrison | Benjamin Robert Haydon | William Hogarth | William Holman Hunt | Thomas Howell Jones | Jerzy Janiszewski | William Edward Kilburn | Käthe Kollwitz | Kunstruct | Wyndham Lewis | Raymond Mason | J Lewis Marks | Lachlan McLachlan / Frederic James Shields / Arthur Hughes | Laurence Stephen Lowry | Members of the International Brigades | Tentative Collective | Tony Minnion | Christopher Richard Wynne Nevinson | Craig Oldham–The Office Of Craig Oldham | Joseph Parry | Raissa Page | Glyn Warren Philpot | Lucien Pissarro | Jean-Louis Prieur | Oliver Ressler | Faith Ringgold | Selim Rothwell | Larissa Sansour | Frederick Sargent/H L Saunders | Vladimir Ossipovitch Sherwood | Henry Singleton | John Slack | Humphrey Spender | Boris Taslitzky | Feliks Topolski | Jakub Valentik | Andy Warhol | Harold Sandys Williamson | Llewellyn Xavier | Carey Young | Johan Zoffany

Manchester Histories

We are partnering with Manchester Histories and will be hosting lots of events linked to the bicentenary of the Peterloo Massacre, with lots of activity from June – August 2019.
Visit peterloo1819.co.uk for full programme details.

This exhibition has been made possible as a result of the Government Indemnity Scheme. Manchester Art Gallery would like to thank HM Government for providing Government Indemnity and the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport and Arts Council England for arranging the indemnity.