The best art exhibitions in London for December 2025
Alongside December’s riot of twinkling lights and exuberant bonhomie, London is, as ever, serving up a glut of excellent exhibitions of wonderfully broad appeal. Turner and Constable are being pitted against each other at Tate Britain. Cult filmmaker Wes Anderson’s archives are being explored via sketchbooks, props and film clips at the Design Museum. There’s a focus on Indian modernism at the Royal Academy. A show of contemporary ceramics is being held at County Hall. There are early works by Piero Fornasetti at Lyndsey Ingram. And with seasonally appropriate timing, a brutalist architect’s Christmas card collection is being shown at Roca London Gallery in Fulham. There’s more, too.
It’s possible to combine looking at art with Christmas shopping. I’ve mentioned before the brilliance of gallery and museum shops, including those at the Royal Academy, the National Gallery, the National Portrait Gallery, and Tate. But it goes further. Commercial galleries, of course, are shops. Several selling shows are listed below – and, keeping in mind the democracy of print, and that works on paper are generally more affordable than those on canvas or board, it can be worth asking what else is available. Alternatively, you might drop into Hauser & Wirth to see Nicolas Party’s extraordinarily vivid paintings of trees – and then decide to peruse their book shop, where a newly published series, grouped under the title In the Studio, chimes with House & Garden’s own investigations into creative’s spaces in looking at the studio practices of the late Phyllida Barlow, Lee Lozano, and Jack Whitten. Notably, these publications are also available to buy online – and while you’re at your computer, you might want to mosey over to Migrate Art, whose proceeds are used for charitable purposes, and note the artist-designed puzzles they’ve got for Christmas, including one by the legendary Jeremy Deller. Arguably, it’s where bonhomie and art collide.
The best art exhibitions in London for December 2025
Howard Agriesti1/47Turner and Constable: Rivals & Originals at Tate Britain
Born within a year of each other, 250 years ago, two of Britain’s greatest painters were also, in their lifetime, the greatest of rivals. Both used landscape to chart the changing world around them – though in completely different ways: one critic of the day compared it to ‘a clash between fire and water.’ This cleverly curated and wondrous exhibition at Tate Britain examines their approaches, lives and legacies, inviting us to examine their brush marks, compositions and cloud studies, and make our own decision as to who was the greater artist – if we can.
Until April 12; tate.org.uk
Pictured: JMW Turner, The Burning of the Houses of Lords and Commons 16 October 1834, 1835. Cleveland Museum of Art.
2/47Come Deck the Halls! At Roca London Gallery
The architects Alison and Peter Smithson, who died in 1993 and 2003 respectively, are best known for the brutalist Robin Hood Gardens housing complex, part of which (following its demolition) is now in the collection of the V&A (and can be seen at the V&A East Storehouse.) But it was far from their only project, and alongside were the unrealised proposals. An exhibition at Roca London Gallery, SW6, provides insight into their architectural thinking through the lens of Alison Smithson’s annual Christmas cards, spanning 1956-1992, a series of artistic expressions that also served as a joyful means of experimentation.
December 5 – January 31; rocalondongallery.com
Pictured: compilation of 4 Alison Smithson-designed cards at different scales
3/47A Grand Chorus: The Power of Music at The Foundling Museum
The Foundling Museum, WC1, is one of London’s lesser-sung treasures – not least for the history it holds. (Which is particularly applicable to anyone with a child currently reading the school syllabus-approved Coram Boy.) And there’s outstanding art, for several artists were major benefactors of the Foundling Hospital, including William Hogarth. Support also came from George Frideric Handel, who wrote an anthem especially to raise funds for the charity, while performances there of his Messiah became an Eastertime tradition, with proceeds going to help the orphans. This winter, an exhibition explores the power of music through Handel’s Hallelujah Chorus, tracing its remarkable journey through three centuries worth of diverse musical traditions, including folk, gospel, and even trance.
Until March 29; foundlingmuseum.org.uk
Pictured: Foundling Hospital chapel interior 1808
- 4/47
Peter Doig: House of Music at Serpentine South
This extraordinary exhibition at Serpentine South in Kensington Gardens, W2, transforms the gallery into something between a club and a dreamland. It’s a space where, while listening to music selected from Peter Doig’s collection of vinyl records and cassette tapes, the viewer (or listener) can simultaneously gaze at the artist’s captivating paintings. There’s Aretha Franklin, Black Truth Rhythm Band, and Neil Young – and surreal lions in de Chirico-reminiscent landscapes, a naked women rollerskating, and revellers carousing around a blue-green lake at night. It’s a show you want to relax into, hang out at – and revisit, time and again.
Until February 8; serpentinegalleries.org
Pictured: Peter Doig, House of Music, Serpentine South; Photo by Prudence Cuming Associates, © Peter Doig. All Rights Reserved and Serpentine
5/47Anna Ancher: Painting Light
Dulwich Picture Gallery, SE21, is holding the first exhibition in this country devoted to one of Denmark’s most important artists, Anna Ancher. She studied in Paris, where she was influenced by French Impressionism and Post-Impressionism and well as the more realist Barbizon school. She put it all into a Scandinavian context, creating an evocative and beautifully rendered record of everyday life in the remote fishing village of Skagen on the norther point of Jylland. The village was an artists’ colony from the late 1870s until the turn of the century – and was where Anna was born and grew up.
November 4 – March 8; dulwichpicturegallery.org.uk
Pictured: Anna Ancher, Sunlight in the blue room, 1891. Oil on canvas. Image courtesy of Skagens Museum
Matt Alexander/PA Media Assignments6/47Wes Anderson: The Archives at the Design Museum
Few contemporary film directors have so stoked the imagination of interiors lovers as Wes Anderson – and now the Design Museum, W8, is giving us his first retrospective, produced in collaboration with la Cinémathèque française. Three decades worth of archives chart the evolution of his vision and the design stories behind films including The Grand Budapest Hotel, The Royal Tenenbaums, and Fantastic Mr. Fox. There are sets and props, including a candy pink model of the Grand Budapest Hotel, the Fendi coat worn by Gwyneth Paltrow as Margot Tenenbaum, and the original stop motion fantastical sea creature puppets that featured in The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou. There is also a screening of Bottle Rocket, the director’s first short film, made in 1993. Booking tickets in advance is strongly advised.
Until July 26; designmuseum.org
Pictured: Wes Anderson at the Design Museum, Photo Matt Alexander
- © Kerry James Marshall7/47
Kerry James Marshall: The Histories at the Royal Academy of Arts
One of the most talked-about shows of the season, Kerry James Marshall’s paintings build on the Western tradition of history painting to explore an African American narrative, while referring to the civil rights movement, comic books, science fiction, and more. This show at the Royal Academy of Arts, W1, is the largest ever to take place outside the US. There are canvases that examine the absence of black figures from the art of the past, a pantheon of portraits of slaves and servants who, in defiance, murdered their masters, and a suite of paintings made specifically for these rooms that look at some of the more challenging moments in Africa’s history.
September 20 – January 18; royalacademy.org.uk
Pictured: Kerry James Marshall, De Style, 1993. Acrylic and collage on canvas, 264.2 x 309.9 cm. Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Purchased with funds provided by Ruth and Jacob Bloom. © Kerry James Marshall. Photo- © Museum Associates/LACMA
- Cecil Beaton8/47
Cecil Beaton’s Fashionable World at the National Portrait Gallery
Known as ‘The King of Vogue’, Cecil Beaton was an extraordinary force across several decades of the 20th century. He elevated fashion and portrait photography into an artform, created some of the defining images of the royal family and other society figures, and, through his film work – and his interiors – created a new aesthetic, combining wit and frivolity with glamour and beauty. This exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery, W1, is curated by writer and Vogue archivist Robin Muir, and gives insight into Cecil’s extraordinary interiors, and well as presenting portraits a plenty, from Bright Young Things to the young Queen Elizabeth II, Jazz Age greats to Lucian Freud.
October 9 – January 11; npg.org.uk
Pictured: Cecil Beaton, Best Invitation of the Season (Nina De Voe in ball gown by Balmain), 1951, Original colour transparency, The Condé Nast Archive, New York.
%2C%25201951%2C%2520Original%2520colour%2520transparency%2C%2520The%2520Conde%25CC%2581%2520Nast%2520Archive%2C%2520New%2520York.%2520copy.jpg)
9/47New Nature at David Gill Gallery
Anybody who read the name Verdura above and was hoping for gemstones will be delighted to hear that their dreams will be met at David Gill Gallery, SW1, where Carol Woolton is curating an exhibition of exquisite pieces that show how nature is expressed in the world of fine jewellery. There are major names, including Michelle Ong and Maurizio Fioravanti, as well as British talent by way of Christopher Thompson Royds, many of whose ethereally beautiful designs double as objets when not being worn.
November 14 – December 22; davidgillgallery.com
Pictured: Christopher Thompson Royds, Double Drop Catkin Earrings, courtesy David Gill Gallery
10/47Cat Spilman: Body Language at Rhodes, London
Cat Spilman’s emphasis is on form and composition over colour, and in this exhibition at Rhodes, W1, her two-toned abstraction is an exploration of the human body, and how it shifts and expands over time. The focus is on brushstrokes, and their fluid movement as they tumble and flow across the canvases, beneath additional lines rendered in oil pastel.
Until December 20; rhodescontemporaryart.com
Pictured: Cat Spilman, Sadie, Sadie, 2025
11/47Atelier Fornasetti: The Poetry of Objects at Lyndsey Ingram
A must for all design aficionados, this exhibition at Lyndsey Ingram, W1, celebrates the radical visual universe of Piero Fornasetti, the Italian artist and designer famous for his production of everyday objects decorated in a manner that would bring art into ordinary people’s homes. Developed in collaboration with Fornasetti in Milan, the show spotlights rare early work – a carmine-red tray adorned with painted fruit and vegetables, a paper basket transformed into a miniature architectural folly – that together demonstrate the breadth of Fornasetti’s visual language as he moved between the Renaissance and Surrealism, classical ruins and modernism, and more.
Until January 16; lyndseyingram.com
Pictured: Atelier Fornasetti, Chair 'Sole', image courtesy of Lyndsey Ingram
12/47Howard Hodgkin: In a Public Garden at Pitzhanger Manor & Gallery
Sir John Soane’s former residence in Ealing is hosting a gloriously comprehensive and colour-rich exhibition of works by Howard Hodgkin, whose art was so affected by his deep, life-long relationship with India. Paintings and prints spanning five decades of his career are being shown alongside archive items that relate to his connection with the subcontinent, including photographs, works on paper, and 17th century Mughal tiles. There’s also a fascinating architectural model showing the artist’s planned mural for the British Council building in New Delhi.
October 1 – March 8; pitzhanger.org
Pictured: Howard Hodgkin, Nick, 1977
- � Lee Miller Archives, England 2013. All rights reserved. www.leemiller.co.uk13/47
Lee Miller at Tate Britain
Lee Miller modelled before she became a photographer, and was photographed by Cecil Beaton. Once behind the lens, she quickly became a leading figure within avant-garde scenes in London, New York, Paris and Cairo. This exhibition at Tate Britain is the most extensive retrospective of her work ever staged in the UK, and explores her position among the Surrealists, as well as her time working for Vogue (she again crossed over with Beaton), which included reporting on World War Two. One of only four female photographers embedded with the US army, her record of the liberation of France, and her discovery of the horrors that had taken place at Buchenwald and Dachau, are acknowledged as some of the most important images of the 20th century.
October 2 – February 15; tate.org.uk
Pictured: Lee Miller, Portrait of Space, Al Bulwayeb near Siwa 1937. Lee Miller Archives. © Lee Miller Archives, England 2025. All rights reserved. leemiller.co.uk
- 14/47
Lisa Brice: Keep Your Powder Dry at Sadie Coles HQ
Famed gallerist Sadie Coles has opened a new space in a grand, six-storey townhouse on Savile Row, W1. The inaugural exhibition shows new work by the South African-born, London-based Lisa Brice, whose paintings have a quiet but powerful dynamism beneath the beauty that draws the viewer in. Working with a reduced and sober palette, informed by Goya’s Black Paintings and the grisaille paintings of Pieter Bruegel the Elder, the artist gives us women in subtle states of rebellion.
Until December 20; sadiecoles.com
Pictured: Lisa Brice, Untitled, 2025 © Lisa Brice. Courtesy the Artist and Sadie Coles HQ, London. Photo Katie Morrison.
- 15/47
Ooo La La: Maggi Hambling and Sarah Lucas at Sadie Coles HQ and Frankie Rossi Art at Hazlitt Holland-Hibbert
Maggi Hambling and Sarah Lucas have been good friends even since they met at the legendary Colony Room Club in Soho over twenty-five years ago. They live close to each other in Suffolk, and their work has been shown together before, notably, at Pallant House in Chichester, when they each offered portraits of the other for Seeing Each Other: Portraits of Artists. This winter, a shared exhibition spans two galleries on Bury Street, St. James’s, and explores the contrasts and continuities in their respective practices, their interest in life, sex, death, and their defiant exuberance.
Until January 24; sadiecoles.com frankierossiart.com hh-h.com
Pictured: Installation view, OOO LA LA, Maggi Hambling and Sarah Lucas, presented by Sadie Coles HQ and Frankie Rossi Art. © Maggi Hambling and Sarah Lucas. Courtesy the Artists, Sadie Coles HQ and Frankie Rossi Art. Photo Katie Morrison
Jonathan Wilkinson16/47David Hockney: Some Very, Very, Very New Paintings not yet Shown in Paris
There’s another new gallery space in Mayfair – and Annely Juda Fine Art is inaugurating theirs, on Hanover Square, W1, with a show of David Hockney’s latest works, comprising both paintings and iPad paintings. There are vibrant interior scenes from the last six months, and the full set of his 2020 series featuring the night sky outside his house in Normandy. Alongside, you might be intrigued to see this feature from the House & Garden archive, of the artist’s 1969 studio flat in Notting Hill.
November 7 - February 28; annelyjudafineart.co.uk
Pictured: David Hockney Vincent's Chair and Gauguin's Chair, 4 July 2025, 2025, acrylic on canvas © David Hockney
17/47Chantal Joffe: I Remember at Victoria Miro
The Victoria Miro Gallery, N1, is presenting a new series of work by Chantal Joffe, that is inspired by the late American artist and writer Joe Brainard’s memoir and poetic prompts that evoke the atmosphere and time of memories. Chantal’s paintings offer a reflective and deeply personal insight into the artist’s childhood, and the show coincides with the publication of Painting Writing Texting, a new book that chronicles the decade-long friendship between Chantal and Olivia Laing.
November 14 – January 17; victoria-miro.com
Pictured: Chantal Joffe, Matrushka Dolls, 2025 © Chantal Joffe Courtesy the artist and Victoria Miro
- 18/47
Wayne Thiebaud: American Still Life at the Courtauld Gallery
Now widely considered one of the greatest American artists of the 20th century, Wayne Thiebaud is known for his vibrant representations of commonplace objects that are often uniquely and quintessentially post-war American: diner food, gumball dispensers, pinball machines. He saw his work as being a continuation of the legacy of artists such as Chardin, Monet, Cézanne, and other artists in the Courtauld’s permanent collection. This exhibition there is the first museum show of his work in the UK.
October 10 – January 18; courtauld.ac.uk
Pictured: Wayne Thiebaud, Cakes, 1963, Oil on canvas, 152.4 x 182.9cm, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. © Wayne Thiebaud VAGA at ARS, NY and DACS, London 2025. Image Courtesy National Gallery of Art, Washington
- 19/47
Nicolas Party: Clotho at Hauser & Wirth
Swiss artist Nicolas Party has gained a devoted following for his style of landscape painting, for his employment of pastel as his medium, and for his immersive exhibitions. At Hauser & Wirth on Savile Row, W1, the white walls of the gallery have turned electric blue, and a succession of arches have been installed that lead the viewer through the space, the better to admire new treescapes and portraits, imbued with symbolism and mythological reference.
Until December 20; hauserwirth.com
Pictured: Nicolas Party, Trees, 2025. Soft pastel on linen. Photo: Thomas Barratt © Nicholas Party Courtesy the artist and Hauser & Wirth
- 20/47
Joy Gregory: Catching Flies with Honey at Whitechapel Gallery
Joy Gregory has been a pioneering force in contemporary photography for four decades, but this show is her first major survey in a British institution, and comes as a result of her winning the Freelands Award. Using a diverse range of media and methods, from Victorian photographic techniques to digital media and performance, Joy’s work explores identity, history, race, gender and societal ideals of beauty – all while retaining an undeniable beauty of its own.
October 8 – March 1; whitechapelgallery.org
Pictured: Joy Gregory Little or no breeze from ‘Seeds of Empire’ 2021 Archival digital print on fine art paper © Joy Gregory
21/47Sickert: Love, Death and Ennui at Piano Nobile
One of the founding members of the Camden Town Group, and then the London Group of artists, Walter Sickert was a vital influence on the avant-garde movements of early 20th century Britain. This exhibition at Piano Nobile, W11, includes oil paintings, pastel works – and a significant collection of prints from The Herbert and Ann Lucas Collection, one of the finest collections of work by Sickert in private hands (and, for those with the means, this is one of the loveliest collections of his work to come onto the market in twenty years.)
Until December 19; piano-nobile.com
Pictured: Walter Sickert, Eglise St.Jaque, Dieppe, courtesy Piano Nobile
- Ardon Bar-Hama22/47
Egypt: Influencing British Design 1775-2025 at Sir John Soane’s Museum
The waves of Egyptomania never quite recede entirely before the next comes along – to the extent that Egyptian-esque ornament has decorated Regency homes, Victorian cemeteries, and Art Deco factories and cinemas. This show at Sir John Soane’s Museum, WC1 - which, in terms of Egyptian antiquities, is well stocked with the real deal - explores our fascination with the ancient civilisation, and all the ways people have brought it into their homes, via Wedgewood china, Liberty fabrics, an Egyptian-style Singer sewing machine, biscuit tins, and more.
October 8 – January 18; soane.org
Pictured: Robert Adam, design for an unexecuted lodge and gateway, Bothwell Castle, Lanarkshire, 1775, pen, pencil and sepia wash on laid paper, SM Adam vol. 21167 copy
23/47Ibrahim Mahama: Parliament of Ghosts at Ibraaz
There’s a brand-new institution – or rather space for art, culture, and ideas – opening in a building in Bloomsbury that has previously been a synagogue and a German cultural centre. An initiative of the Kamel Lazaar Foundation, Ibraaz has got an exhibition space, a library, a café, a cross-disciplinary programme, and it is all completely free to go and explore. The inaugural show features Ghanaian artist Ibrahim Mahama’s presentation of a site-specific adaptation of an ongoing production. Using colonial-era furniture and jute sacks, he has transformed the main space of the building into a meditation on memory and restitution that speaks to Ghana’s post-independence transition.
October 3 – February 15; ibraaz.org
Pictured: Ibrahim Mahama, Parliament of Ghosts, courtesy of Ibraaz and Ibrahim Mahama; photo by Hugo Glendinning
%2520no.2%2c%25202023%2520copy.jpg)
24/47Duan Jianyu: Yúgiáo at YDP
There’s another new contemporary art project space opening in Bloomsbury this month. YDP in Bedford Square, W1, is founded by philanthropist Yan Du to support diverse Asian and Asian diasporic artists. The first exhibition presents a new series of paintings and sculptures by Duan Jianyu, that explore life in an increasingly globalised and urbanised China.
October 14 – December 20; ydp.co
Pictured: Duan Jianyu, Yúqiáo (The Fisherman and The Woodcutter) No.2, 2023
%2520No.2%2C%25202023%2520copy.jpg)
- Théo van Rysselberghe (1862 - 1926)25/47
Radical Harmony: Helene Kröller-Müller’s Neo-Impressionists at the National Gallery
The second half of the 19th century saw a revolution in art - but while it was the Impressionists who broke away from classical academic representation, it was the Neo-Impressionists who paved a way forward. One of the first Pan-European movements, artists including Georges Seurat, Paul Signac, Théo van Rysselberghe, and Vincent Van Gogh used a technique that has become known as pointillism, applying small dots of pure colour to the canvas. Based on scientific principles of colour theory, they believed it afforded a more intense hue than the traditional mixing of colours on a palette. This exhibition at the National Gallery, W1, (the first to be mounted in the newly revamped Sainsbury wing), is drawn largely from the Netherlands-based collection of Helene Kröller-Müller, supplemented by works from public and private collections from around the world. It’s an opportunity to appreciate the breadth and extraordinary luminosity of paintings that influenced so many later artists and movements, and that were a precursor to abstraction.
September 13 – April 8; nationalgallery.org.uk
Pictured: Théo van Rysselberghe (1862 - 1926) Boulogne-sur-Mer, 1899 Oil on canvas Collection Kröller-Müller Museum, Otterlo, the Netherlands © Collection Kröller-Müller Museum, Otterlo, the Netherlands Photographer- Rik Klein Gotink
26/47Sean Scully: Mirroring at the Estorick Collection
The Estorick Collection, N1, is hosting an ‘intervention’ by Sean Scully, who House & Garden visited in his studio earlier this year. Showing a collection of his work dating from the 1960s to the present day, alongside Giorgio Morandi’s early 20th century still-lifes, Sean traces the arcs of practices, finding moments of mirroring. While you’re there, do spend time looking at the institution’s permanent collection of Italian Futurism – it’s one of the city’s lesser-known gems.
October 8 – November 23; estorickcollection.com
Pictured: Sean Scully, Blue Wall, 2024, copyright Sean Scully
- Jack Elliot Edwards27/47
Janet Leach at Willoughby Gerrish
The Texas-born Janet Leach was studying ceramics at the famous Black Mountain College in North Carolina, when, in 1952, she met Bernard Leach. He was on a lecture tour, along with Shoji Hamada, with whom in 1920 Bernard had founded the Leach Pottery in St. Ives. On Bernard’s advice, Janet went to Japan to work for Hamada. In 1955, she and Bernard married, and returned to the pottery he had established in Cornwall, where Janet’s work continued to be influenced by Japanese aesthetics. In her lifetime, her pots, thrown in a variety of clays and using different firing techniques, were exhibited widely in England and Japan, and in 2006 there was a retrospective of her work at Tate St. Ives. Now, Willoughby Gerrish is holding a dedicated exhibition, in association with Jonathan Reed, at the gallery’s showroom on Savile Row, W1.
December 5 – 19; willoughbygerrish.com
Pictured: Janet Leach Tall lugged vase, c.1980; image courtesy Willoughby Gerrish
- George Darrell28/47
Tony Cragg at Lisson Gallery
Last summer, Tony Cragg’s wondrous sculptures, that combine his interests in the natural and manmade worlds and explore the possibilities of material, adorned the gardens and grand rooms of Castle Howard in North Yorkshire. Now Lisson Gallery, NW1, is holding an exhibition of new and recent work, in stainless steel, bronze and stone, centred around the latest in his series of Incident sculptures. There are numerous upright forms, resembling standing figures or columnar pillars, but which are abstracted through the artist’s rigorous process of hand carving.
Until January 31; lissongallery.com
Pictured: Tony Cragg, Contradiction, 2024, Bronze © Tony Cragg, Courtesy Lisson Gallery
%2520%2520Boulogne-sur-Mer%2C%25201899%2520%2520Oil%2520on%2520canvas%2520%2520Collection%2520Kro%25CC%2588ller-Mu%25CC%2588ller%2520Museum%2C%2520Otterlo%2C%2520the%2520Netherlands%2520%2520%25C2%25A9%2520Collection%2520Kro%25CC%2588ller-Mu%25CC%2588ller%2520Museum%2C%2520Otterlo%2C%2520the%2520Netherlands%2520Photographer-%2520Rik%2520Klein%2520Gotink.jpg)
%2520copy.jpg)
Reinis Lismanis29/47County Hall Pottery Presents HOUSE at County Hall
There are more ceramics on the South Bank: County Hall Pottery is an initiative to transform County Hall, SE1, into a vibrant destination for ceramics. This winter they’re presenting a selling exhibition that, by transforming the galleries into a series of domestic spaces, demonstrates how contemporary ceramics might live within the home – occasionally in quite surprising ways. Featuring work from 50 ceramic artists from around the world, there are items such as Sellotape dispensers and stools, as well as bookends, planters, and tableware in a wide variety of styles, and price points.
Until December 24; countyhallpottery.com
Pictured: Camille Biddell’s Watering Cans
30/47Royal Institute of Oil Painters Annual Exhibition at the Mall Galleries
The ROI is the only major art society devoted exclusively to the art of oil painting, and their annual exhibition, held at the Mall Galleries, SW1, is an opportunity to see over 300 works across a wide variety of genres, from landscape to still life. There is familiarity to be found in beautiful paintings of Venice, the Norfolk coast, and Staithes - and there is also, this year, a special focus on ‘Home’, which sees a glorious collection of interior portraits. Almost all the works are available to buy, in person and online, (prices start below £1000), and the artists themselves are available for commission.
Until December 13; mallgalleries.org.uk
Pictured: The White Door, Thinking of Sargent by Alexis Guenier
%2520sarah%2520campbell%2520copy%25202.jpg)
31/47Women in Print: 150 Years of Liberty Textiles at William Morris Gallery
William Morris Gallery, which is based in the Arts and Crafts designer’s former home in Walthamstow, E17, is presenting an exhibition conceived in partnership with Liberty. The show surveys the evolving influence and status of women within textiles, while bringing together iconic patters by artists and designers including Althea McNish, Sonia Delaunay, and Lucienne Day. There are over 100 works, spanning garments, fabric, original designs, film, and historic photographs.
Until June 21; wmgallery.org.uk
Pictured: Susan Collier and Sarah Campbell, Quickstep, c.1970 (C) Sarah Campbell
©Daniel Correa Mejía, courtesy Maureen Paley, London32/47Wolfgang Tillmans: Build from Here at Maureen Paley
The American gallerist Maureen Paley was among the first to show art in London’s East End – she opened her first gallery in 1984 – beginning the transformation of the city into a major centre for contemporary art. This month, she’s extending with a new space on Herald Street, which once served as part of Wolfgang Tillmans’ studio, before he moved his production to Berlin in 2011. The inaugural show is devoted to Tillmans, and presents new photographic work, new photocopy works, and two recent video works.
October 3 – December 20; maureenpaley.com
Pictured: Wolfgang Tillmans, studio light, 2006, © Wolfgang Tillmans, courtesy Maureen Paley, London
%2520copy.jpg)
%2520Sarah%2520Campbell%2520copy%25202.jpg)
%2520tate.%2520%25c2%25a9%2520succession%2520picasso%2520dacs%2c%2520london%25202025%2520copy.jpg)
Tate Photography33/47Theatre Picasso at Tate Modern
This exhibition at Tate Modern, SE1, which celebrates the centenary of his famous painting The Three Dancers, is being staged in a space that has been transformed into a theatre. It is thus paying homage to Picasso’s fascination with performance - he designed sets and costumes for the Ballets Russes, and painted flamenco dancers, circus workers, entertainers, and bullfighters. There are major loans coming from across Europe, some of which have never been seen before in the UK.
September 17 – April 12; tate.org.uk
Pictured: Girl in a Chemise (1905) Tate. © Succession Picasso DACS, London 2025 copy
- 34/47
A Story of South Asian Art at the Royal Academy
This show at the Royal Academy, W1, looks at the avant-garde artists who have shaped Indian modernism from the 1930s to the present day, with particular focus on the radical work of sculptor and textile artist Mrinalini Mukherjee, which fused abstraction with the human form. The exhibition also features work by her parents Leela Mukherjee and Benode Behari Mukherji, who taught at Kala Bhavana in Santiniketan, West Bengal the pioneering art school founded in 1919 by the poet Rabindranath Tagore.
Until February 24; royalacademy.org.uk
Pictured: Mrinalini Mukherjee and works in progress at her garage studio. New Friends Colony, New Delhi, c.1985. Courtesy of Mrinalini Mukherjee Foundation and Asia Art Archive. Photo by Ranjit Singh.
35/47Nigerian Modernism at Tate Modern
Also atTate Modern, SE1, this show brings together the work of over 50 artists who were working in the years leading up to and following Nigeria’s 1960 national independence. It tells the stories of different artistic networks, and shows how the fusing of African and European traditions created something vibrant and new.
October 8 – May 10; tate.org.uk
Pictured: Jimo Akolo Fulani Horsemen 1962 Courtesy Bristol Museum and Art Gallery
- 36/47
Gilbert & George: 21st Century Pictures at the Hayward Gallery
The iconoclastic duo Gilbert & George have become renowned for addressing traditional taboo subjects – which, they maintain, is to “de-shock” the viewer, and thus promote tolerance. This exhibition at the Hayward Gallery presents their pictures from the last twenty-five years.
October 7 – January 11; southbankcentre.co.uk
Pictured: Gilbert & George, HA-HA, 2022. Mixed media. 74.8 x 88.98 x 1.5 inches, 190 x 226 x 3.81 cm. © Gilbert & George. Courtesy the artists and Lehmann Maupin, New York, Seoul, and London
%2520Tate.%2520%25C2%25A9%2520Succession%2520Picasso%2520DACS%2C%2520London%25202025%2520copy.jpg)
- 37/47
Encounters: Giacometti x Mona Hatoum at the Barbican Centre
The second of three Barbican exhibitions organised in partnership with the Fondation Giacometti, this show presents his work – including the iconic Woman with Her Throat Cut of 1932 - in dialogue with that of the Lebanese artist Mona Hatoum. Staged in the Barbican’s new Level 2 gallery space, almost a century of artmaking is spanned, and
there are sculptures in plaster, bronze, steel and brass, alongside installation, works on paper, and video. Both artists have worked in times of global conflict and have a common interest in how art can serve to bring viewers into a disquieting reality.
September 3 – January 11; barbican.org.uk
Pictured: Alberto Giacometti, Project for the Chase Manhattan Plaza: Walking Man, Standing Woman, Head on a Base, 1959, courtesy Fondation Giacometti
- 38/47
Emily Kam Kngwarray
Tate Modern, SE1, is holding the largest ever presentation devoted to the renowned Aboriginal Australian artist Emily Kam Kngwarray. A founding member of the Utopia Women’s Batik Group, the show features her vibrant textiles as well as vast paintings that reflect her ancestral heritage, and are an unexpectedly moving record of love for an area of land.
July 10 – January 11; tate.org.uk
Pictured: Emily Kam Kngwarray, Ntang Dreaming 1989. NGA, Canberra © Emily Kam Kngwarry Copyright Agency. Licensed by DACS 2025 copy
.jpg)
39/47Shifting Ground: Art by First Nations Women of Australia at The Arts Club
For more from Emily Kam Kngwarray, head to The Arts Club on Dover Street were work by her is being shown alongside other leading Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women artists, affirming their place in the global narrative of modern and contemporary art. And while The Arts Club is members only, the exhibition is open to non-members, on Wednesdays and Saturdays, by appointment.
October 6 – January 24; theartsclub.co.uk
Pictured: Yukultji Napangati, Untitled (2019)
40/47The Barber in London: Highlights from a Remarkable Collection at The Courtauld Gallery
Birmingham’s loss is our gain – as exceptional paintings from the Barber Institute of Fine Arts go on display at The Courtauld Gallery, WC2. The two institutions were founded at the same time; both were intended to encourage the study and public appreciation of art, and both are home to two of the finest collections of European art in this country. Among the highlights are paintings by Frans Hals, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, James Abbott McNeil Whistler, and Edgar Degas.
Until February 22, 2026; courtauld.ac.uk
Pictured: Claude Monet, The Church at Varengeville, The Henry Barber Trust, The Barber Institute of Fine Arts, University of Birmingham
.jpg)
- Damian Griffiths41/47
Louise Giovanelli: Decades at St. Mary-le-Strand
On exiting the Courtauld, don’t miss Louise Giovanelli’s new commission, presented by Create London and Westminster City Council, which responds to James Gibb’s baroque jewel of a church, St. Mary-le-Strand, by way of a temporary intervention consisting of a sculptural trompe l’oeil.
Until January 18; createlondon.org
Pictured: The installation ‘Decades' by artist Louise Giovanelli illuminated at St Mary-le-Strand Church in London, courtesy Westminster City Council and Create London, photo Damian Griffiths
42/47Noémie Goudal: The Story of Fixity at Borough Yards
There is also a new installation at Borough Yards, SE1, commissioned by Artangel from Noémie Goudal. The artist has designed an immersive and mesmeric three-channel film that reflects on water’s shaping of our landscape, it’s role in transporting minerals, and its being an essential element that can both sustain and destroy.
Until December 21; artangel.org.uk
Pictured: Installation View- Artangel, The Story of Fixity, by Noemie Goudal. Photo by Thierry Bal
43/47Under a Grand at New King’s House
Georgie Grandy of Grandy Art’s pre-Christmas show, staged in her showroom, SW6, has become an anticipated calendar date for the interior designers she works with, and those who are already acquainted with her cleverness at finding quality, original art that is perfectly suited to the domestic space. This year’s exhibition features new work by Guy Allen, Ben Brotherton, Alex Cree, Emily Crookshank, Sophia Webb – and many more. All of it, as promised by the title, is priced under £1000.
Until December 12; grandyart.com
Pictured: Alex Cree, Towards Weymouth Beach
- GOUSSET44/47
Robert Coutelas: In Search of Small Gods at Pale Horse
Pale Horse is another new opening in W1, and their first exhibition is devoted to the work of French artist Robert Coutelas, whose oeuvre was shaped by unrelenting poverty. Unable to afford conventional materials, his intimate paintings are composed on pieces of found cardboard, cut out from discarded boxes picked up from the Paris streets. Explorations of his inner world, there are references to myths, legends, theatre, biblical stories, the history or art, and more. Alongside is beauty – and inspiration in his determination to keep creating, even against the odds.
November 6 – December 13; palehorsegallery.com
Pictured: Robert Coutelas, ‘Mes Nuits’, 1984, Photo Fabrice Gousset, Courtesy Galerie Loeve & Co Paris and Pale Horse, London
%2520The%2520installation%2520%25E2%2580%2598Decades_%2520by%2520artist%2520Louise%2520Giovanelli%2520illuminated%2520at%2520St%2520Mary-le-Strand%2520Church%2520in%2520London%2C%2520courtesy%2520Westminster%2520City%2520Council%2520and%2520Create%2520London%2C%2520photo%2520Damian%2520Griffiths%2520copy.jpg)
45/47Charles March: Sandscript at Hamiltons Gallery
“I want my pictures to create an impression, a feeling, by holding onto a moment in nature that would otherwise be lost as soon as it appears,” says Charles March, the Duke of Richmond and Gordon, of this new body of work that is being shown at Hamiltons Gallery, W1. The photographs continue Charles’s journey into abstraction, through images captured along the shoreline, each the result of patient observation of shadows, lines, and textures that appear as calligraphic inscriptions before being swept away by wind or tide.
November 4 – January 16; hamiltonsgallery.com
Pictured: Charles March, Sandscript, Seriess 1, 01 © Charles March
46/47Foals and Fables at Osborne Studio Gallery
At Osborne Studio Gallery, SW1 – which specialises in sporting and equestrian art - a joint exhibition by Jessica Hills and Rose Osborn brings together twenty new works inspired by horses, folklore, motherhood, and storytelling.
December 3 – 23; osg.uk.com
Pictured: A Mother’s Love by Jessica Hills
- 47/47
Lina Lapelyté at The Cosmic House
On the subject of house museums, there are few more extraordinary than The Cosmic House, which is on Lansdowne Road, W11. For years it was the family home of famed architect and landscape designer Charles Jenks, his wife, the writer and designer Maggie Keswick, and their children. (You might have seen Charles’s Landform in front of the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art in Edinburgh, or his Cells of Life at Jupiter Artland.) A leading proponent of Post-Modernism, the London house became an opportunity to create a ‘cosmic house’ that explores the meaning of time, the seasons, and the galaxies. The staircase are ‘solar stairs’, with a step for each week of the year, and they’re lit by the silvery light of the ‘moonwell’ above. There’s a spring room, and a winter room, and a non-working jacuzzi by fellow PoMo architect Piers Gough based on an upturned version of Borromi’s Renaissance dome. Increasing the allure is a new, site-specific exhibition by Lina Lapelyté, who was part of the creative team responsible for the indoor beach and opera installation that won a Golden Lion at the 2019 Venice Biennale. Now, she’s collaborated with a group of performers to explore the themes of the house via performative and musical video work.
Until December 19; jencksfoundation.org
Pictured: In the Dark, We Play, 2025, video still by Martynas Norvaišas, commissioned by the Jencks Foundation at The Cosmic House
Comments
Back to Top
