New Exhibition GRIEF MUST BE LOVE WITH NOWHERE TO GO Opens at Warrington Museum

An upcoming exhibition at Warrington Museum & Art Gallery will explore how people experience grief and loss, while offering visitors a space for reflection and shared understanding. Grief Must Be Love With Nowhere To Go, a collaborative project by artists Chris Alton and Emily Simpson, opens Saturday, February 14 and runs through April 19, with free admission.

Alton and Simpson both lost parents suddenly in their mid-twenties and met in late 2016 while attending an exhibition. At the time, neither felt able to openly discuss their grief, but the shared experience became the foundation of a lasting artistic and personal collaboration. Both artists describe that connection as a turning point, offering mutual support at a time when grief felt isolating and difficult to articulate.

Over time, those conversations informed their individual practices and ultimately led to joint work focused on how grief is expressed, processed, and often silenced. Their latest exhibition examines the language used around death and bereavement, questioning whether existing vocabulary adequately reflects the complexity of mourning.

The project has grown through workshops and participatory art-making sessions, during which Alton and Simpson invited others to share words and phrases connected to loss. These contributions are brought together in a large-scale textile installation that forms the centerpiece of the exhibition.

Both artists note that while facilitating conversations about grief can be emotionally demanding, the process has consistently left participants feeling supported and less alone. They emphasize the importance of creating environments where people can engage with grief at their own pace, including acknowledging that there are moments when individuals may not feel ready to confront it.

The exhibition space is designed to function as a place of care and reflection, where language itself becomes a form of shelter. Alton and Simpson have undertaken counselling skills training, mental health first aid certification, and safeguarding work, and have consulted with mental health professionals and access specialists to ensure the exhibition is presented sensitively.

Grief Must Be Love With Nowhere To Go continues Alton and Simpson’s long-term exploration of grief as a shifting, contradictory experience—one that can encompass pain, anger, tenderness, and love simultaneously.

GRIEF MUST BE LOVE WITH NOWHERE TO GO