Jake Attree falls into the latter category – he is not quick to indulge in self- praise. There are, however, plenty of others willing to blow his trumpet for him.

One of those who recognises the quality of this artist is Vic Allen. Fortunately, he is the arts director at Dean Clough, the Halifax arts and business complex and has the power to bring Attree's work to a wider audience: which is why the Crossley Gallery is currently dominated by Attree paintings.

The Crossley is the major gallery space at Dean Clough Mills and will show work by Attree for the next three months. The exhibition is particularly pleasing to the artist as it is being shown at what is essentially his second home – his studio is at the Halifax arts complex.

In the Dean Clough studio where Attree has painted for the best part of 13 years, paintings are stacked here and there with seemingly little care. Attree moves about his studio with the comfort and ease of someone in the front room of his home. It is unsurprising that Attree is so comfortable here – he doesn't sit around waiting for the muse to arrive – he is in the studio from 9am to 5pm, seven days a week.

The studio reflects the fact: it looks lived in. Books on Turner, Monet and other artists who inspire Attree are scattered about. Photographs are arranged in piles all over the surfaces.

Attree is quiet, unassuming, dressed in a scarf to keep warm in the studio where water runs down the walls.

While Attree is subdued, Vic Allen is exuberant and loud and starts several sentences with: "The great thing about Jake is..." The list of things that are great about Jake include his use of texture, his use of light and the energy in his paintings; his work ethic, his willingness to lend help to young artists and so on.

While Allen is a good ambassador, Attree is the kind who likes his work to speak for itself. Fortunately, his paintings give a good account of themselves.

Attree's work was last seen in Yorkshire at York Minster last year. While he has exhibited around the country, regularly with London's Hart Gallery which represents him, Attree says there is a special feeling about exhibiting in his home county. The work on show in Halifax was inspired by his home town of York.

The first painting that hits you when you arrive at the exhibition is an enormous diptych which covers the back wall of the gallery. It is a view of York, looking over the red tiles of the roofs of the houses towards the Minster.

"I lived in London for 11 years and I loved it. It's a great city, but there was never any emotional connection to it as a place," says Attree.

"Living in London, you always feel like a tourist and that influenced the way I painted the places I was looking at.

"When I came back to Yorkshire (he now lives in Saltaire) I felt much more emotionally connected to
the place and was able to paint scenes with that emotional connection."

Standing among his paintings in the Crossley Gallery, that connection to the paintings is obvious.

The Minster casts a large and heavy shadow, but it is one which inspires Attree.

"I think it is fascinating to think about the millions of people who have walked past this ancient building, each with their own stories, lives and troubles," says Attree.

"I want to capture the spiritual grandeur of a building like the cathedral and also reflect the lives of ordinary people who move around it."


Shows at Dean Clough Mills

Jake Attree: Marks on a White Ground. To Jan 25.

Romanian Artists: Illustrate This! The work of 20 Romanian artists and four artists from Yorkshire. Inspired by storytelling, the exhibition is a diverse collection of illustrations, oil paintings and boxed assemblages which point to cultural differences in approach to narratives. To Dec 9, Upstairs Galleries.

Scott Mason: The Light / The Dark: Mason, who has worked in advertising for the past two decades has been producing art for the past nine years. This show features a giant white-cube space, plasma screen renditions of his life and colour coded interpretations of various texts, including the Book of Genesis. To Jan 25, Seminar Room.

James Reid: Atrocity Exhibition Part 1

London-based photographer James Reid's work combines a monochrome documentary essay on Auschwitz with large-scale colour photographs of rare wartime Nazi figurines. To Jan 25