The exhibition runs from Friday 10 May – Sunday 25 August at The Weston Gallery, Lakeside Arts, University of Nottingham

The exhibition brings together materials from Manuscripts and Special Collections across the East Midlands, showing how the facts and the fantasies of the Romantic period could encompass the global, the national and the local, the very large and the microscopic. It reveals that male and female Romantic writers and artists were fearless in their engagement with the major issues that confronted them, issues that still resonate with us today. Alongside materials from our own collections we are also presenting exciting art and artefacts on loan from local museums, such as Derby Museums and Newstead Abbey. One loan item of particular interest is the painting by Joseph Wright of Derby, A Cottage on Fire, which we are showing courtesy of Derby Museums.