Harsh life in mining Wales is captured in forthcoming exhibition at Leamington gallery

David Carpanini: A Painter-Printmaker And His World will portray how Carpanini’s paintings, etchings and drawings are almost entirely devoted to the presentation of the valleys and former mining communities of south Wales. Lonely figures, scarred landscapes and perching terraces of houses are the images to which he is faithful and to which he attributes the development of his creative imagination.

Professor Carpanini was born in the Afan Valley in Glamorgan, Wales, in 1946, but he has actually spent most of his working life in England and has lived in Leamington for the past 25 years.

But he said: “A man will always love that place on earth which nourished his boyhood.”

The collection on display will convey a lifetime of work with Carpanini’s open etchings, alongside carefully constructed paintings. Each image concentrates on man-made ugliness and the harsh reality of human life - yet he also aims to convey a poetic beauty.

The exhibition opens on Friday January 24 and runs until April 21. Entry is free.