Top exhibitions on now in London

EXHIBITIONS OPENING IN LONDON THIS MONTH

David Hockney: Drawing From Life, National Portrait Galley, review ★★★★★

David Hockney is arguably Britain’s greatest living artist, and this collection of portraits at the National Portrait Gallery shows us why; it’s filled with diverse works and while it is largely drawings, as the title suggests, paintings and photography feature heavily too.

Women In Revolt!, Tate Britain, review ★★★★★

In the early 70s, equal pay wasn’t in place for women, nor were there any sex-discrimination laws, and there were no shelters for victims of domestic violence. This bleak picture is set out at the beginning of Tate Britain’s feminist exhibition, which charts how British artists challenged gender norms between 1970 and 1990. It’s an impressive exhibition that starts punchy and continues to land crucial blows throughout.

Antony Gormley: Body Politics, White Cube Bermondsey

‘Each part of this show is an attempt to assess and reflect on our present condition: us now.’ Antony Gormley's new exhibition is his most political and will display over 250 of the artist's latest works. It will include body forms and concrete bunkers for ones.

Christo and Jeanne Claude: Boundless, Saatchi Gallery

Christo and Jeanne Claude are best known for wrapping the Pont Neuf in Paris and other monumental installations. But what did it take to achieve those challenging artworks? The Saatchi Gallery promises a thorough retrospective of the couple's extraordinary journey.

ONGOING EXHIBITIONS THAT WE'VE SEEN AND RECOMMEND

The Cult of Beauty, Wellcome Collection ★★★★★

What is beauty, and why are we obsessed with it? The Wellcome Collection's thorough exhibition delves into our eternal quest for unachievable beauty, the role of power and politics in defying what is beautiful and what is not, and some century-old tricks to improve one's appearance. Cleverly curated and fascinating.

Frans Hals, The National Gallery ★★★★★

A jovial lute player strums away and glances off to the side at something just out of frame; it’s the type of fleeting micro-expression that Dutch painter Frans Hals was excellent at capturing. These moments preserved in oil paintings are everywhere in this exhaustive National Gallery exhibition on the portraits of Hals.

El Anatsui, Tate Modern Turbine Hall ★★★★★

The Ghana-born, Nigeria-based artist El Anatsui takes over Tate Modern’s Turbine Hall for six months.

His bottle-cap gigantic tapestries made from flattened bottle tops dazzle the Hall and remind of a couture gown.

El Anatsui’s work – which became popular in the early 2000s – has been collected by many institutions worldwide, including the British Museum and the Centre Pompidou in Paris.

Hiroshi Sugimoto, Hayward Gallery, review ★★★★★

What happens if you compress a two-hour film into one long exposure photograph? Instead of the film, you get a bright white screen, but it allows you to observe the beautiful architecture inside a movie theatre or the star trails above for a drive-in cinema. That’s what Hiroshi Sugimoto does in one series of photos in his major show at Hayward Gallery.

Time Machine features selections from Sugimoto’s major photographic series and lesser-known works, illuminating his innovative, conceptually driven approach to making pictures.

Profoundly serene.

Gucci Cosmos, 180 Strand review ★★★★★

Gucci Cosmos, the itinerant exhibition celebrating the house signatures bags and other designs from its 102-year history, opens in London after getting much attention in Shanghai earlier this year.

The London show, set in the brutalist basement of 180 the Strand, offers quite a unique proposition where playful sets, giant sculptures and multimedia artworks, imagined by set designer extraordinaire Es Devlin, propel the visitor into a dizzy labyrinth filled with luggage and garments drawn from Gucci's archive.

Gabrielle Chanel. Fashion Manifesto, V&A review ★★★★★

Gabrielle Chanel. Fashion Manifesto is a grand affair. Its opening at the V&A marks the beginning of the European Fashion Week season, and the hype is so high that it is already sold out until December.

Gabrielle Chanel designed, first and foremost, for herself.

The exhibition is dedicated to the work of French couturière ‘Coco’ Chanel, retracing the evolution of her style and the establishment of the House of Chanel from the opening of her first millinery boutique in Paris in 1910 to the showing of her final collection in 1971.

Marina Abramović, Royal Academy of Art ★★★★★

Marina Abramović’s grand show at the RA finally sees the light after being postponed twice because of the pandemic. The performance artist’s first major retrospective feature over 50 works, including photographs, videos, installations and ‘re-performances’ by the next generation of artists trained in the Marina Abramović method.

For those new to Abramovic this exhibition will drive home how she has revolutionised performance, quite literally putting her body on the line in the name of art. It’s intense, it’s discomfiting, it’s memorable and it’s performance art at its finest.

Sarah Lucas: Happy Gas, Tate Britain, review ★★★★★

Legs, breasts and penises. They are everywhere you look in this exhibition of works by Sarah Lucas at Tate Britain – looking back on four decades of her practice. It’s a show that’s playful, sexually charged and at times, extremely dark.

Rebel: 30 Years of London Fashion, Design Museum review ★★★★★

Rebel: 30 Years of London Fashion is an ode to the capital’s creativity and a must-see exhibition for aspiring fashion designers.

Mat Collishaw: Petrichor, Kew Gardens, review ★★★★★

Bowerbirds perform their elaborate courtship dances, hummingbirds sip nectar from flowers, and flowers open and close in a sculpture by Mat Collishaw. However, it’s all an optical illusion created by the sculpture spinning and the strobe lighting.

DIVA exhibition, V&A review ★★★★★

Rihanna, Amy Winehouse, Maria Callas, Marylin Monroe, Beyoncé…

‘Divas’ are pop culture icons whose influence resonates far beyond their singing talent.

Coined in a male-dominated 19th century to describe female opera singers with ‘godsent’ voices, today, the word diva

The V&A exhibition showcases a selection of costumes worn on stage or in movies ranging from the cultish to the sublime that one discovers while listening (thanks to high-quality headphones) to the diva’s magnificent performances.

Capturing the Moment, Tate Modern, review ★★★★★

Painting and photography are two of the most prevalent mediums for practising artists, but are they more closely tied together than we might think? That’s the premise behind Tate Modern’s new exhibition, that is packed with superb artworks by brilliant artists.

Georg Baselitz: Scultpure 2011–2015, Serpentine Gallery ★★★★★

Georg Baselitz, the giant German artist and provocateur, is known for turning his painting upside down and creating scandal at the Venice Biennale in 1980 with an infamous carving that may have represented a figure performing a Nazi salute.

But the Serpentine Gallery’s exhibition avoids all drama to offer instead a glimpse into the artist’s practice and sculptural process. The wooden sculptures, carved into massive trunks, starkly contrast the gallery’s surrounding majestic trees still in their living forms. But it is the drawings that steal the show.

Idris Khan & Annie Morris: When loss makes melodies - Pitzhanger, review ★★★★★

A stack of colourful spheres by Annie Morris may look like a joyful, if slightly off-kilter sculpture, and dense blocks of black in the works of Idris Khan may appear impenetrable at first. But behind the works of both artists, there’s a profound grief that manifests through their works in the artist couple’s joint exhibition at Pitzhanger in Ealing.

REBEL: Thirty Years of London Fashion, Design Museum ★★★★★

Rebellious London takes centre stage at the Design Museum.

Sponsored by Alexander McQueen and co-curated by Sarah Mower – the British Fashion Council’s Ambassador for Emerging Talent – the exhibition celebrates the London designers who have influenced the global fashion scene.

With some extraordinary outfits on display and the work of over 300 designers, including Simone Rocha, JW Anderson, Wales Bonner, Molly Goddard, Christopher Kane and Erdem, this exhibition is a must-see for aspiring designers.

A World In Common: Contemporary African Photography, Tate Modern, review ★★★★★

Tate Modern’s exhibition A World in Common opens with a statement on the horrors of colonialism and slavery, and this wall text faces off with George Osodi’s Nigerian Monarchs series: regal portraits of rulers whose powers were eroded through colonialism but still play an important role.

UVA – Synchronicity, 180 The Strand

Immersive art collective United Visual Artists (UVA) will present its largest exhibition with eight new immersive and sensory-heightening artworks that challenge our perception of reality.

The collective’s practice, which has collaborated with many artists and musicians, from Massive Attack to choreographer Benjamin Millepied, draws inspiration from science, mathematics, psychology and philosophy and uses advanced digital technologies and traditional methods to create sculptures, performances and large-scale installations.

One of the most anticipated artworks of the exhibition is an audiovisual installation which explores the relationship between humans and animals, and features a soundscape created by bioacoustician Bernie Krause.

ALSO WORTH SEEING…

Young V&A reopens ★★★★★

The Young V&A used to be a museum about remembering childhood, and now it’s one for celebrating childhood.

Frameless, Immersive Art Experience, Marble Arch ★★★★★

How does it feel to get inside one of your favourite paintings? Frameless is a new multidimensional art experience that opened in London in October. It consists of projecting animated paintings – often very well-known ones – from floor to ceiling in four gigantic rooms.

The experience is highly Instagrammable and can be utterly absorbing. Imagine being surrounded by giant versions of Salvador Dali's melting clocks, or walking the leafy path up to Cézanne's Chateau Noir. It will certainly seduce a young digital-savvy audience and might even convince hard-core art lovers, too. A pity that, at £25+, entrance is so pricey.

PRIVATE GALLERIES EXHIBITIONS TO SEE THIS MONTH