John B Ledger

John Ledger: artist

(b. 1984, Barnsley, South Yorkshire).

My practice began over 20 years ago as both a coping strategy for mental health and eating disorder struggles, and as a way to develop self-confidence in my own image.

After leaving an art degree at Manchester Metropolitan University in 2003 due to an eating disorder, I graduated in my home town via the University of Huddersfield in 2007.

Being in a post-industrial town informed how I began making, and an ongoing series of large-scale drawings became the most enduring and recognizable part of my practice. These landscape-based works critique our historical/cultural moment at the point where it becomes ‘personal’. Their story-telling was a more immediate way to engage with my environment and reflect my situation.

Since then I have gone on to explore numerous ways of working, audio/visual art, participatory projects, but also developing my own engagement with regional landscapes, through map-making and writing.

From winning the ‘South Yorkshire Young Artist of the year’ award, 2008, I have exhibited in over 40 group and 10 solo shows, and been published over 8 times.

Notable achievements include being in the ‘New International Art Exhibition at Treadwell Gallery, Austria, 2012, featuring in ‘Now Then’ magazine, Sheffield, 2013, co-curating the group project ‘Fighting for Crumbs’, Sheffield, Wakefield and Liverpool, 2016, the solo exhibition ‘A Radical redemption’ at Bloc Projects, Sheffield, 2022, and co-founding the artist-led collective ‘The Retro bar at the End of the Universe’, 2015.

I’ve worked to sustain creative friendships within communities in nearby Leeds and Sheffield, which culminated in completing a Masters in fine art at the University of Leeds, 2019. A lot of my work, although about national and global political climates takes it’s inspiration from the post-industrial and suburban belts that straddle between these two cities.