From fashion extravaganzas to Turner Prize-winning sculptors and iconic painters, here’s our pick of the art installations and museum exhibitions to catch in the city this season…
Basquiat: Boom for Real
Discover the work of Jean-Michel Basquiat, the pioneering prodigy of the 1980s downtown New York art scene. This unprecedented exhibition brings together an outstanding selection of more than 100 works from international museums and private collections.
Barbican Art Gallery, Barbican Centre, Silk St, London EC2Y 8DS; running from 21st September 2017 until 28th January 2018
Visit Barbican.org.uk
Balenciaga: Shaping Fashion
Examining the work and legacy of influential Spanish couturier Cristóbal Balenciaga, this exhibition features over 100 pieces crafted by ‘the master’ of couture, his protégées and contemporary fashion designers working in the same innovative tradition.
V&A, Cromwell Rd, Knightsbridge, London SW7 2RL; running now until 18th February 2018
Visit VAM.ac.uk
Jasper Johns: Something Resembling Truth
The first comprehensive survey of Jasper Johns’ work to be held in the UK in 40 years, this must-visit exhibition comprises over 150 paintings, sculptures, drawings and prints from one of the world’s most important painters alive today.
Royal Academy, Burlington House, Piccadilly, Mayfair, London W1J 0BD; running from 23rd September until 10th December 2017
Visit RoyalAcademy.org.uk
Rachel Whiteread
One of Britain’s leading contemporary artists (and the first woman to win the Turner Prize back in 1993) Whiteread uses industrial materials to cast evocative sculptures of everyday objects and architectural space. This show tracks her momentous career and features never-before-seen pieces.
Tate Britain, Millbank, Westminster, London SW1P 4RG; running now until 21st January 2018
Visit Tate.org.uk
Ann Veronica Janssens
This extensive solo exhibition of Janssens’s work includes new and recent sculptures and installations exploring spatio-temporal experience and the limits of perception.
White Cube, 25-26 Masons Yard, St. James's, London SW1Y 6BU; running from 27th September until 12th November 2017
Visit WhiteCube.com
Taylor Wessing Photographic Portrait Prize
The world’s leading photographic portrait competition returns for 2017, celebrating and promoting the very best in contemporary portrait photography.
National Portrait Gallery, St Martin's Place, London WC2H 0HE; running from 16th November 2017 until 4th February 2018
Visit NPG.org.uk
Torbjørn Rødland: The Touch That Made You
A stunning collection of work from Torbjørn Rødland, the Los Angeles-based photographer who creates portraits, still lifes and landscapes, which simultaneously inhabit, defamiliarise and disrupt the realm of the everyday.
Serpentine Sackler Gallery, West Carriage Drive, London W2 2AR; running from 29th September until 19th November 2017
Visit SerpentineGalleries.org
Cézanne Portraits
This major international exhibition brings together for the first time over fifty of Cézanne’s portraits from collections across the world, including works which have never been on public display in the UK.
National Portrait Gallery, St Martin's Place, London WC2H 0HE; running from 26th October 2017 until 11th February 2018
Visit NPG.org.uk
Thomas Ruff: Photographs 1979 – 2017
This exhibition will draw from the full range of Ruff’s output: from his acclaimed passport-style portraits, to his most recent photographs, drawing on newspaper archives from the era of the space race and Hollywood starlets.
Whitechapel Gallery, 77-82 Whitechapel High St, London E1 7QX; running from 27th September 2017 until 21st January 2018
Visit WhiteChapelGallery.org.uk
Tove Jansson (1914-2001)
See over 150 works, including self-portraits and never-before-seen paintings, from Tove Jansson - one of the most celebrated illustrators of the 20th century, known best for creating the Moomin books.
Dulwich Picture Gallery, Gallery Road, Southwark, London SE21 7AD; running from 25th October 2017 until 29th January 2018
Visit DulwichPictureGallery.org.uk
Gilbert & George: The General Jungle or Carrying on Sculpting
Comprised of twenty-three monumental, multi-panel pieces, The General Jungle or Carrying on Sculpting reinforcing their reputation as ‘living sculptures’—an identity and belief maintained by the artists since they met at St Martin’s School of Art, London, fifty years ago this September.
Lévy Gorvy, 22 Old Bond Street, Mayfair, London W1S 4PY; running now until 18th November 2017
Visit LevyGorvy.com
Dalí / Duchamp
Presented as a conversation taking place through art, this original exhibition brings together around 80 works, including some of Dalí’s most inspired paintings and Duchamp’s groundbreaking assemblages.
Royal Academy, Burlington House, Piccadilly, Mayfair, London W1J 0BD; running from 7th October 2017 until 3rd January 2018
Visit RoyalAcademy.org.uk
Harry Potter: A History Of Magic
This thrilling new exhibition will showcase a fascinating display of wizarding books, manuscripts and magical objects, and combine centuries-old British Library treasures with original material from Bloomsbury’s and J.K. Rowling’s own archives.
British Library, 96 Euston Road, Kings Cross, London NW1 2DB; running from 20th October 2017 until 28th February 2018
Visit BL.uk
Haroon Mirza: HRM199 - For A Partnership Society
Marking the ten-year anniversary of this Chalk Farm space, Mirza's commission will rework two of his previous pieces into a new installation that will reflect the architecture of what was once a Methodist chapel.
Zabludowicz Collection, 76 Prince of Wales Rd, Belsize Park, London NW5 3PT; running from 28th September to 17th December
Visit ZabludowiczCollection.com
