What's On

Aida Muluneh Water Life Series, Star Shine, Moon Glow 2018 commissioned by WaterAid and supported by the H&M Foundation © Aida Muluneh

A World in Common: Contemporary African Photography

Date: 6 July 2023 – 14 January 2024

Address: Tate Modern, Bankside, London SE1 9TG

Summary: Bringing together a group of artists from different generations, this exhibition curated Osei Bonsu, will address how photography, film, audio, and more have been used to reimagine Africa’s diverse cultures and historical narratives. Moving beyond a traditional photography exhibition, the show seeks to explore the many ways images travel across histories and geographies. Using themes of spirituality, identity, urbanism and climate emergency, the exhibition will guide the viewer through dream-like utopias and bustling cityscapes viewed from the artists’ perspectives

To find out more about the exhibit, please visit the following link.

Nadia Huggins, Only the invisible remain. Circa No Future., Printed on Hahnemühle Photo Rag, 60 x 80 cm, Edition 1 of 5, Courtesy of the artist

1-54 Presents: Transatlantic Connections: Caribbean Narratives in Contemporary Art

Date: 10 October 2023  – 13 October 2023 

Address: Christie’s London

Summary:1-54 Presents is pleased to announce Transatlantic Connections: Caribbean Narratives in Contemporary Art, a group exhibition presented on the occasion of 1-54 Contemporary African Art Fair’s 11th London edition, curated by caryl* ivrisse crochemar & [creative renegades society]. On view at Christie’s, London from 10 – 13 October 2023, this exhibition brings together a curated selection of works by artists from the Caribbean and Caribbean diaspora to explore cultural similarities across generations and geographies. Transatlantic Connections is the second-ever show by 1-54  Presents, a new programme of pop-up exhibitions by 1-54 Art Fair, and will feature work by Juan Carlos Alom, Sonia Elizabeth Barrett, Sonia Boyce, Helen Cammock, Michael Forbes, Satch Hoyt, Nadia Huggins, Alain Joséphine, Anina Major, Marcia Michael, Johanna Mirabel, Lavar Munroe, Horace Ové, Zak Ové, Ada M. Patterson, Sheena Rose, Jamilah Sabur, Charmaine Watkiss, Alberta Whittle, Aubrey Williams. 

To find out more about the exhibit, please visit the following link.

Claudette Johnson, Figure in blue, 2018, Pastels and gouache on paper, 163 x 133 cm, Arts Council Collection, Southbank Centre, London.© Claudette Johnson. Image courtesy the artist and Hollybush Gardens, London. Photo: Andy Keate

Claudette Johnson: Presence

Date: 29 September 2023 – 14 January 2024

Address: The Courtauld Gallery

Summary: A major exhibition of work by one of the most significant figurative artists of her generation. Presenting key early drawings alongside recent and new works, this exhibition will offer a compelling overview of Claudette Johnson’s pioneering career and artistic development. 

To find out more about the exhibit, please visit the following link.

Eileen Perrier, Untitled 1, Afro Hair and Beauty, 1998 © Eileen Perrier

The Missing Thread

Date: 29 September 2023 – 14 January 2024

Address: Somerset House

Summary: This autumn, Somerset House explores the stories of Black British fashion in a major new exhibition, The Missing Thread, curated by the Black Orientated Legacy Development Agency (BOLD). Spanning from the 1970s to the present day, The Missing Thread charts the shifting landscape of Black British culture and the unique contribution it has made to Britain’s rich design history. 

To find out more about the exhibit, please visit the following link.

45 (Between the Seams)

Date: 22 September 2023 – 31 October 2023

Address: PM/AM, 37 Eastcastle Street, London W1W 8DR

Summary: PM/AM commences its autumn exhibition programme with a guest curated show taking place at the gallery’s central London space organized by Larry Ossei-Mensah and Paul Anthony Smith entitled Between The Seams. Between The Seams expands the concept of ‘interstices’ beyond its basic definition as an intervening space. For the exhibitions, the curators view interstice as a framework that could take the the form of a social construct, a personal ideology, a mechanism by which we engage with art or a descriptor for an aspect of an artwork itself. Ossei-Mensah and Smith endeavour to utilise the idea of interstices or the in-between spaces as a forum to interrogate notions of hybridity, memory, migration, colonialism, culture, identity, peronal narratives and the seen and unseen. Featured artists: Layo Bright, Emmanuel Massillon, Carl E. Hazlewood, Muna Malik, Leasho Johnson,Samuel Levi Jones, Brooklin Soumahoro, Shaqúelle Whyte and Didier William.

 

To find out more about the exhibit, please visit the following link.

© Rikard Österlund

Hyundai commission El Anatsui

Date: 10 October 2023 – 14 April 2024

Address: Turbine Hall,Bankside London SE1 9TG

Summary: One of the most distinctive artists working today, El Anatsui has developed a highly innovative approach to sculpture, embracing a wide range of forms and materials including wood, ceramics and found objects. Since the late 1990s he has experimented with liquor bottle tops, the product of a global industry built on colonial trade routes. Pushing the boundaries of sculpture in new and exciting ways, Anatsui’s metal hangings are monumental in scale and flexible in structure. Embodying Anatsui’s idea of the ‘non-fixed form’, they fold easily in order to travel and appear differently with each separate installation. Interested in the changing histories of the objects he repurposes, Anatsui combines African aesthetic traditions with the global history of abstraction. Over several decades, his practice has explored the evolution of human civilisation, African decolonisation movements, histories of migration and life’s existential journeys.

To find out more about the exhibit, please visit the following link.

Third World: The Bottom Dimension © Serpentine. Photo: Hugo Glendinning

Third World: The Bottom Dimension

Date: 23 June – 22 October 2023

Address: Serpentine North Gallery

Summary: Third World: The Bottom Dimension is a journey into a fantastical and thought-provoking world, built by a vital generation of Brazilian artists. It is part of an ongoing and multi-dimensional project of the same name by Gabriel Massan and collaborators, which includes web3 tokens built on Tezos and a video game that explores Black Brazilian experience as it intersects with the impacts of colonialism. This exhibition is curated by Tamar Clarke-Brown, Arts Technologies Curator/ 

To find out more about the exhibit, please visit the following link. 

(Details) African Liberation Day, Handsworth Park, photograph, by Vanley Burke, 1977. © Vanley Burke

Between Two Worlds: Vanley Burke and Francis Williams

Date: Closes on 31 December 2023

Address: V&A South Kensington

Summary: Explore portraits of two Jamaican gentlemen scholars. Burke’s photography and archives, alongside historical artefacts and scientific images shedding new light on the Williams painting, invite reflections on quests for identity and colonial legacies.

To find out more about the exhibit, please visit the following link. 

Lagos, Peckham, Repeat: Pilgrimage to the Lakes

Date: 5 July – 29 October 2023

Address: South London Gallery

Summary: Known as ‘Little Lagos’, Peckham is home to one of the largest Nigerian diaspora communities in the UK. Lagos, Peckham, Repeat: Pilgrimage to the Lakes is a major group exhibition looking at the connections between Lagos in Nigeria and Peckham in south east London. The exhibition highlights the relationships, culture, shared history, communities and art that link the two places. Themes explored include transnational exchange, a sense of place and the contemporary metropolis. The exhibition showcases works by thirteen Nigerian and British-Nigerian artists, bringing together sculpture, photography, sound and filmThe exhibition is co-curated by Folakunle Oshun, founder and director of the Lagos Biennial, together with South London Gallery

To find out more about the exhibit, please visit the following link. 

Genetic Automata exhibition, Dust to Data. Gallery Photo: Steven Pocock. © Larry Achiampong and David Blandy

Genetic Automata

Date:  – 

Address: Wellcome Collection 183 Euston Road London NW1 2BE

Summary: ‘Genetic Automata’ is an ongoing body of video works by artists Larry Achiampong and David Blandy exploring race and identity in an age of avatars, videogames and DNA ancestry. The four films in the series investigate where deeply ingrained ideas about race come from and the role that science has played in shaping these perceptions. The exhibition premieres ‘_GOD_MODE_’, the newest film in the series, commissioned by Wellcome Collection, Black Cultural Archives and Wellcome Connecting Science.

To find out more about the exhibit, please visit the following link. 

Credit Eva Herzog // Barbican Art Gallery

Julianknxx - Chorus in Rememory of Flight

Date:

Address: Barbican Centre

Summary: Poet, artist and filmmaker Julianknxx explores themes of inheritance, loss and belonging as he crosses the boundaries between written word, music and visual art. Sierra Leonian artist Julianknxx uses his personal history as a prism to deconstruct dominant perspectives on African art, history, and culture. Rich with symbolism, his work conveys the Black experience of defining and redefining the self, rejecting labels to form new collective narratives.

To find out more about the exhibit, please visit the following link. 

1-54 x The Africa Centre: Open Day

Date: 14th of October

Address:  The Africa Centre, 66 Great Suffolk St
London SE1 0BL 

Summary: We invite you to an afternoon and evening of African art, refreshments, and music at The Africa Centre. Enjoy African food, drinks, and cocktails, surrounded by a mix of Afrobeat, Amapiano, and High-Life music. Our space will be open for mingling, and will feature two brilliant exhibitions running in parallel, in partnership with This is Not a White Cube Gallery and Africa Soft Power, respectively. Climate Change and Your Community Exhibition: Africa Soft Power, in association with African Women on Board, launched the Climate Change Photo Essay Prize for young people by open call earlier this year. Doux Free, a Rwandan photographer, was chosen by the judges as the overall winner for his series Misty Morning of Changes. The other finalists are Nigerian photographer Eiseke Bolaji, Togolese photographer Emerson Lawson, and Nigerian photographer Abubakar Sadiq Mustapha. Portraits for English to See: A collaboration between Angolan-Portuguese gallery This is Not a White Cube and The Africa Centre, London, featuring a debut solo show by Santomean artist René Tavares. The exhibition is curated by the acclaimed Angolan architect and curator Paula Nascimento, winner of the 2013 Golden Lion for Best National Participation at the Venice Biennale.

To find out more about the exhibit, please visit the following link. 

Titaness, production image, 2023. Courtesy of the artists.

San Mei Gallery - Titaness: Love is a state of mind

Date: 8 Sep – 4 Nov 2023

Address: San Mei Gallery, 39a Loughborough Road, London SW9 7TB

Summary: San Mei Gallery presents the inaugural exhibition by London-based artist duo Titaness, including a new installation featuring sculpture, sound and performance. Titaness is an artist duo comprised of Maria Joranko and Tiffany Wellington. Their collective interdisciplinary practice is shaped by their dual interests in memory, opacity, and love, explored through storytelling, sculpture, sound, and performance. Infusing their personal experiences and lineages with localised and diasporic viewpoints through a Caribbean and South American lens, they explore the potentialities of storytelling to weave alternate worlds.

To find out more about the exhibit, please visit the following link. 

Souad Abdelrasoul in her studio, 2022. Courtesy of the artist.

Almas Art Foundation - Souad Abdelrasoul, Like a single pomegranate

Date: 10 — 14 October 2023

Address: Fitzrovia Gallery, 139 Whitfield St, London W1T 5EN

Summary: Almas Art Foundation is delighted to announce its forthcoming week of projects celebrating the remarkable works of Souad Abdelrasoul. Like a Single Pomegranate, curated by Sahar Behairy, will bring together a compelling selection of paintings and drawings by the Cairo-based artist. The exhibition will mark the launch of a short documentary film on the artist as well as a publication featuring insightful texts by Sahar Behairy, Dr Orabi Mohamed Fayad, and Fatima Ali, produced by Almas Art Foundation. Souad Abdelrasoul’s art encapsulates moments of both struggle and triumph experienced by women navigating the complexities of a patriarchal system. Her work delves deep into the human experience, transcending conventional boundaries to offer a profound exploration of empowerment, self-discovery, and the intricate interplay between the human body and mind.

To find out more about the exhibit, please visit the following link. 

Black Curatorial's 'The Big Boi Lab - 2023'

Date: 14 October 2023

Address: 64 Cheshire Street London E2 6EH

Summary:Black Curatorial’s biggest lab of the year, the ‘Big Boi Lab’ is here!! On the 14th October, 12-6pm. The Black Curatorial Labs are Black only spaces for Black curators (be they attached to an institution, independent or aspiring), thinkers and writers to congregate, share and experiment.
Both virtual & physical spaces, our focus is on curatorial experimentation and play. The Black Curatorial Labs create space where Black curators are able to discuss, dissect and build curatorial projects together in a critical and accountable way.

To find out more about the exhibit, please visit the following link.