It is once again time to round up our top 10 exhibitions happening in London right now. This art season is rich in offerings: blockbuster retrospectives, immersive installations, thematic shows, historic exhibitions – there is something for every art lover to discover in this city.
1. Yoko Ono: Music of the Mind
Yoko Ono: Music of the Mind at Tate Modern (February 15 – September 1, 2024) pays tribute to the important artist and activist Yoko Ono. It is the UK’s most extensive exhibition honoring her contributions to conceptual and participatory art, music, and peace advocacy. Spanning seven decades of her career, the exhibition showcases over 200 works, including instruction pieces, installations, films, music, and photography, offering insight into Ono’s radical approach to language, art, and participation.
At the core of the exhibition are Ono’s works from her five-year stay in London beginning in 1966, during which she also met her future husband and collaborator John Lennon. Visitors will also be invited to interact with Ono’s art in a new iteration of her participatory installation pieces.
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While you're there, the exhibition Capturing the Moment, exploring the relationship between photography and modern painting, has been extended until April 28. Pairing works from the YAGEO Foundation Collection with recent acquisitions from Tate’s collection, the show includes paintings by Francis Bacon, Gerhard Richter, and Peter Doig, alongside photographs by Thomas Struth, Andreas Gursky, and Hiroshi Sugimoto.
Over at Tate Britain, Women in Revolt!, which runs until April 7, surveys feminist art created in the UK from 1970 to 1990. It features over 100 women artists and collectives from the UK, spanning from the first women’s liberation conference to the end of the Thatcher administration.
2. Barbara Kruger: Thinking of You. I Mean Me. I Mean You.
Barbara Kruger: Thinking of You. I Mean Me. I Mean You. at Serpentine South (February 1 – March 17, 2024) is the first solo institutional exhibition in London in over 20 years of American visionary Barbara Kruger.
Kruger, a prominent contemporary artist known for her bold and provocative works, explores themes of power, consumerism, and identity, fusing imagery with words in a signature style of black-and-white photographs overlaid with striking text in red blocks.
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Her art often critiques the influence of mass media and advertising, inviting audiences to consider the manipulation inherent in visual language. The exhibition, curated in collaboration with the artist, will feature a selection of installations, image works and soundscapes reconfigured in recent years as video works.
3. DIVA
DIVA at the V&A South Kensington (June 24, 2023 – April 27, 2024) celebrates a number of iconic performers from the 19th century to today with an exhibition that showcases over 250 items from the V&A collections and loans from global institutions. The show is an opportunity to admire spectacular costumes by 'divas' such as Maria Callas, Cher, and Marilyn Monroe, alongside photography, memorabilia, music and live performances.
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The show is not only a celebration of glamour, but also a space to discuss the different meanings of ‘diva’ through popular culture, and how the word has been reclaimed since the 1960s.
4. Entangled Pasts, 1768–now
Entangled Pasts, 1768–now at the Royal Academy of Arts (February 3 - April 28, 2024) is an ambitious project of bringing together over 100 works spanning 250 years, from the foundation of the Royal Academy in 1768 to today. The show, presented across the RA’s main galleries, aims to confront the institution’s colonial past. Entangled Pasts was programmed in 2021 in response to public debates about the relationship between art and imperial histories, with a particular focus on British artists of the African, Caribbean, and Indian diasporas. Artworks by leading contemporary artists such as Lubaina Himid, Frank Bowling, and Sonia Boyce stand in dialogue with historical works by Joshua Reynolds, Thomas Gainsborough, and J.M.W. Turner, organized around themes of empire, race, and colonialism.
For the exhibition, a new monumental public sculpture by Bahamian-born conceptual artist Tavares Strachan has been unveiled in the courtyard. Inspired by Leonardo da Vinci’s The Last Supper, Strachan’s The First Supper (Galaxy Black) reimagines a supper between 12 historical figures from Africa and its Diaspora, including men and women such as Harriet Tubman, Marsha P. Johnson, and Emperor Haile Selassie I of Ethiopia (which, in The First Supper, takes the place of Jesus). The 13th figure, reimagined as Judas, is a self-portrait of Strachan himself.
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Visitors of the Royal Academy will also have the opportunity to see Lord Leighton's Flaming June, one of the most famous works from the Victorian period, on free display until January 12, 2025. The masterpiece, first unveiled at the Royal Academy in 1895, was auctioned in the 1960s and purchased by the Museo de Arte de Ponce in Puerto Rico, which has loaned it to the Academy while it remains closed for repairs.
5. Clockwork Treasures from China’s Forbidden City
Zimingzhong 凝时聚珍: Clockwork Treasures from China’s Forbidden City at the Science Museum (February 1 – June 2, 2024) brings together 23 glorious clockwork treasures once beloved by Chinese emperors and loaned from The Palace Museum in Beijing. Displayed in the UK for the first time, these 18th-century mechanical clocks, called 'c', combine aesthetics, timekeeping, and music of the highest craftsmanship.
Most of the clocks in the exhibition were made in England to be given as trade gifts to Chinese emperors and dignitaries – attesting to a flourishing period of international trade between China and Europe.
6. Zineb Sedira: Dreams Have No Titles
Zineb Sedira: Dreams Have No Titles at Whitechapel Gallery (February 15 - May 12, 2024) is the UK debut of the critically acclaimed exhibition Dreams Have No Titles by French-Algerian artist Zineb Sedira. Originally conceived for the French Pavilion at the 59th Venice Biennale, Sedira's multimedia installation invites visitors into an immersive experience, blurring the lines between fiction and documentary, personal and collective experiences.
Through meticulously constructed film sets referencing iconic movies and the artist's own heritage, Dreams Have No Titles explores the transformative power of filmmaking during the culturally rich and politically charged 1960s and 70s in France, Italy, and Algeria. Drawing inspiration from cinematic masterpieces like Battle of Algiers and L'Etranger, Sedira's installations delve into themes of decolonization, solidarity, and resilience, offering a poignant reflection on the complexities of history.
7. Unravel: The Power and Politics of Textiles in Art
Unravel: The Power and Politics of Textiles in Art at the Barbican (February 13 - May 26, 2024) presents the work of artists spanning from the 1960s to the present day, who have harnessed the transformative potential of textiles to challenge and reimagine notions of power and authority. Featuring over 100 artworks by 50 international artists, the exhibition showcases a diverse range of pieces, from intimate hand-crafted works to large-scale installations. The exhibition is organized around six themes: 'Subversive Stitch', 'Fabric of Everyday Life', 'Borderlands', 'Bearing Witness', 'Wound and Repair', and 'Ancestral Threads'.
Featured artists include Feliciano Centurión, whose embroidered blankets reflect on his HIV diagnosis in 1993; T. Vinoja, whose hand-stitched aerial landscapes explore themes of loss and displacement inspired by testimonies from the Sri Lankan Civil War; Yinka Shonibare CBE RA, with the figurative sculpture Boy On A Globe, addressing race, class, and imperialism through Dutch Wax fabrics; Cecilia Vicuña, whose Quipu Austral installation links the history of textiles to cultural oppression and environmental devastation – among many others.
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8. Frank Auerbach: The Charcoal Heads
Frank Auerbach: The Charcoal Heads at The Courtauld Gallery (February 9 – May 27, 2024) presents a group of 17 large-scale portrait heads in charcoal, regarded as early masterpieces of the German-British artist Frank Auerbach. Created during his formative years in post-war London in the 1950s and 1960s, these monumental portraits exemplify Auerbach’s innovative approach to drawing, pushing the boundaries of charcoal beyond convention. Each work, developed over months of intense sessions with subjects close to the artist — without the aid of photography — bears witness to Auerbach’s rigorous process. Often involving cycles of drawing, erasing, and reworking the portraits completely, sometimes even breaking through the paper, the result is portraits that are richly textured and layered, simultaneously dark and vital.
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Auerbach, who regarded these drawings as equal in status to his paintings, captured the unique experiences of his subjects, giving a glimpse into the atmosphere of post-war London as lives were rebuilt amidst the aftermath of the Second World War.
9. Soulscapes
Soulscapes at Dulwich Picture Gallery (February 14 - June 2, 2024) is an exhibition of landscape art that redefines the genre through the perspectives of artists from the African Diaspora. Curated by Lisa Anderson, Managing Director of the Black Cultural Archives and founder of Black British Art, the exhibition features over 30 contemporary works spanning various mediums such as painting, photography, film, and tapestry.
Related: 14 Black Artists Who Changed Art History
Reflecting on themes of belonging, memory, joy, and transformation, the show explores our connection with the natural world as seen through the eyes of leading artists including Hurvin Anderson, Phoebe Boswell, Njideka Akunyili Crosby, Kimathi Donkor, Isaac Julien, Marcia Michael, Mónica de Miranda and Alberta Whittle, as well as important emerging contemporary artists.
10. Legion: Life in the Roman army
Legion: Life in the Roman Army at the British Museum (February 1 - June 23, 2024) delves into the everyday experiences of one of history’s most formidable military forces. From protecting a superpower to daily domestic life in military communities across the vast Roman Empire, Legion offers insights into the diverse backgrounds and motivations of Roman legionaries. With over 200 objects, including loans from 28 lenders worldwide, the exhibition showcases iconic Roman military artifacts alongside evidence of real-life individuals, challenging perceptions and highlighting the army’s role as a catalyst for social change.
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Notable highlights include the world’s only intact legionary shield and recently discovered Roman body armor, as well as the remains of a soldier found at Herculaneum, who will be reunited with his belt and equipment for the first time outside of Italy.
Whatever you choose, happy exploring from Barnebys!
