BRADFORD artist Martin Hearne is inspired by the people, streets and buildings of Bradford’s urban communities.

He has captured local landscapes and landmarks, including the Oastler Centre and Roberts Park in colourful paintings.

Last year Martin’s paintings were exhibited in A Bigger Bradford at the city’s Trapezium Gallery. Now he has had a painting accepted by the Royal Academy of Arts for its Summer Exhibition.

The painting, Cloth House Bradford, features shops on Oak Lane in Manningham - although, says Martin: “the rapidly changing nature of much of the Bradford landscape means the shops featured no longer trade on Oak Lane.”

He adds: “The theme for this year is ‘Only Connect’ inspired by a passage in the EM Forster novel Howards End.

“In Forster’s novel the phrase meant a connection between the spiritual and the quotidian, and the individual and society. I’ve always thought my painting has been an attempt to make these connections visible by reflecting the quotidian through everyday scenes on the streets of Bradford.”

The Summer Exhibition opens on June 13. Says Martin: “The RA receives approximately 15,000 entries and around 1,200 works, in a range of media, will go on display. The Summer Exhibition is the world’s largest open-submission contemporary art show, which has taken place every year since 1769. Works from all over the world are judged on merit. Most are for sale. Funds raised support the exhibiting artists, postgraduate students studying in the RA Schools and the work of the Royal Academy.”

Martin, who taught Ceramics at Bradford College of Art for more than 20 years, takes inspiration from “travelling along the same streets every day, seeing the same characters going to work, parents taking their kids to school, and the same buildings in changing light and weather.

"In my paintings of Bradford I’ve made an attempt to reflect my everyday experience of the city and make a record of a familiar place.”