Entangled Pasts, 1778–now: Art Colonialism and Change, brings together over 100 major contemporary and historic artworks as part of a conversation about art and its role in shaping narratives around empire, enslavement, resistance, abolition and colonialism.

Organised into three thematic sections that intertwine narratives across time and engage over 50 artists connected to the institution, the exhibition will include El Anatsui’s installation Akua's Surviving Children from 1996. This powerful piece represents a clan of survivors from the Danish slave trade, which operated between Ghana, formerly the Gold Coast, and the Danish West Indies.

El Anatsui’s work Terra Firma is now on view in a new exhibition at MAK, Vienna.
HARD/SOFT: Textiles and Ceramics in Contemporary Art, showcases work from around 40 international artists, many whose work is being exhibited in Vienna for the first time. The exhibition explores the interplay between textiles and ceramics and examines the materials’ connections with economic and political systems. Furthermore, the exhibited works investigate themes relating to cultural appropriation and post-colonialism.

Tapfuma Gutsa’s work is presented alongside contemporary artists Maria Thereza Alves, ikkibawiKrrr, Oswaldo Maciá and Uriel Orlow at Elizabeth Xi Bauer’s new exhibition É a lama, é a lama. These artists’ practices acknowledge our climate emergency and turn their gaze to one aspect of our planet, depicting elements such as flora, fauna, water, fire, geological formations and typhoons to address global warming.

É a lama, é a lama is curated by Maria do Carmo M. P. de Pontes.

Tate Britain has dedicated a room to the work of Aubrey Williams, a significant aspect in the institution’s 2023 complete rehang of the world’s greatest collection of British art for the first time in 10 years.

Titled Aubrey Williams: Cosmological Abstractions, 1973–85, the display consists of paintings created in the 1970s and the 1980s, and explores Williams' involvement with ecology, cosmology, music and pre-colonial civilisations.

Visitors can now discover the galleries laid out chronologically, from the 1500s to the present day, with the relationship between British art and the wider world being a major theme throughout. Each solo exhibition room, devoted to major historic figures such as William Blake and John Constable amongst others.

Congratulations to El Anatsui! We are delighted that Tate Modern unveils a monumental sculptural installation created by the internationally acclaimed Ghanaian artist.

The Hyundai Commission: El Anatsui: Behind the Red Moon is staged in three acts which visitors are invited to move between. The first hanging, titled The Red Moon, resembles the majestic sail of a ship billowing out in the wind, announcing the beginning of a journey across the Atlantic Ocean. Red liquor bottle-tops form the outline of a red moon, or ‘blood moon’, as it appears during a lunar eclipse.

The second sculpture, , is composed of many individual layers that evoke human figures suspended in a restless state. The ethereal appearance of these figures is achieved using thin bottle-top seals wired together to create a net-like material. When viewed from a particular vantage point, these scattered shapes come together into a single circular form of the Earth.

In Anatsui’s final hanging, The Wall, a monumental black sheet of metal cloth stretches from floor to ceiling. At its base, pools of bottle tops rise from the ground in the form of crashing waves and rocky peaks. Behind its black surface, a delicate structure of shimmering silver is revealed, covered in a mosaic of multi-coloured pieces. This combination of lines and waves, blackness and technicolour, echoes the collision of global cultures and hybrid identities that Anatsui invites us to consider throughout his work.

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Burn, burn, burn - The Beats light up the Ox will explore the nonconformist world of the Beat Generation and the diverse artistic expressions of this influential movement.

Included is the work Untitled by William S. Burroughs —a fusion of ink and spray paint on a file folder, with words and inscriptions surfacing through the layers. From drawing to performance, music to photography, and film to art, the Beat Generation's experiments yielded a riotous tapestry of colour and controversy.

This exhibition presents a significant body of work by internationally renowned artist Romuald Hazoumè, based on his dedicated study of Fâ divination.

Romuald Hazoumè: The Fâ Series presents twenty-two works, primarily from the mid-1990s. The majority of these large-scale canvases draw from the visual lexicon associated with Fâ, evoking its sacred knowledge through symbols and signs. The show is organised by the Neuberger Museum of Art and curated by Christa Clarke, independent curator, art historian and Senior Advisor at the Center for Curatorial Leadership.

Reconnect Through Love, a group exhibition at Omaka Gallery, highlights the multi-layered and diverse nature of Black love through the perspectives of internationally acclaimed and emerging artists. This showcase endeavours to shed light on the collective experiences of love, offering a genuine and authentic perspective on the myriad forms this powerful emotion can embody. Alexis Peskine is represented by his large-scale nail portrait Kassu Demdemi (Fire Now), in which each meticulously placed nail symbolises a profound connection and resilience within the narrative of Black identity.

Infinity Festival in Margate will celebrate the work of internationally acclaimed artist Govinda Sah ‘Azad’ whose large-scale paintings will be exhibited for the first time in his hometown. The Margate-based contemporary artist is inspired by the ambient light of Thanet, the skyscapes of his homeland Nepal and the mysteries of our cosmos.

Alongside an exhibition of Sah's paintings are workshops, talks, meditation sessions and two special performances featuring Margate-based dancer and choreographer Ash Mukherjee and the Orchestra from Everywhere, which brings together musicians and music from around the world.

October Gallery are thrilled that works by Romuald Hazoumè feature in The Stuff of Life | The Life of Stuff, a new, major international exhibition which opened on 10th September, 2023 at the Sainsbury Centre, Norwich, UK.

Visitors can view artworks composed of salvaged materials, re-synthesised fragments, and e-waste. They will encounter new environmental zones, where synthetic and organic matter interact, providing a fertile ground for the invention of mythical worlds, dystopias and speculative future narratives.

A major bottle-top work by El Anatsui also is featured in this exhibition, which includes works by Madi Acharya-Baskerville; Mandy Barker; Karla Black; Maarten Vanden Eynde; Ayan Farah; Daiga Grantina; Diana Lelonek; Ibrahim Mahama Mary Mattingly; Fabrice Monteiro; Marlie Mul; Samara Scott; Tejal Shah; Elias Sime; Michael E. Smith; Sarah Sze; Gavin Turk.

The Fitzwilliam Museum presents a landmark exhibition, Black Atlantic: Power, People, Resistance, which explores new stories from history and investigates which stories get remembered and why.

By bringing together collections from across the University of Cambridge’s museums, libraries and colleges with loans from around the world, Black Atlantic: Power, People, Resistance asks new questions about Cambridge’s role in the transatlantic slave trade and looks at how objects and artworks have influenced history and perspectives. Historical works are shown alongside modern and contemporary works by artists, including Sokari Douglas Camp CBE, Alexis Peskine, Barbara Walker and Donald Locke — each of them challenges and reflects on hidden and untold stories.

We are delighted to announce that the exhibition of works by Hassan Massoudy and Zana Masombuka at Honey & Smoke Grill House is now extended until 6th January, 2024! To accompany the new season, Honey & Smoke will serve their Christmas Feast Menus for large parties.

This collaboration between October Gallery and Honey & Smoke celebrates shared cultural traditions, the ritual of dining together and the combination of heritage and modernity in both food and art.

Elegant, gestural, calligraphic works on paper by Hassan Massoudy are presented on the ground floor of the restaurant. Born to a traditional Iraqi family, Massoudy trained in Baghdad and Paris. A master artist-calligrapher, his work connects with the Middle Eastern influence and tradition through the written word, with peace and tolerance as central themes in his work.

Zana Masombuka, an artist from South Africa, presents a body of striking photographic works in the downstairs area of the restaurant. Her work engages with the intersection of tradition with the modern age, especially through Ndebele culture, symbolism and material contrast, in a radical re-examination of the self.

More about Honey & Smoke & Co here honeyandco.co.uk

October Gallery presents new works by Alexis Peskine and paintings by Govinda Sah ‘Azad’, alongside selected etchings, paintings and ceramics by Rachid Koraïchi, for the 2023 edition of Abu Dhabi Art,

Highlights include arresting new large-scale, mixed-media ‘portraits’ by Alexis Peskine. The artist portrays the African diaspora by creating works rendered by hammering gold and silver leafed nails of different gauge, with pin-point accuracy, into wood stained with black pigment, white hibiscus petals, coffee and mud. Metaphorically connecting the nail to the Black experience, Peskine depicts figures that reveal strength, perseverance and self-possession. Also on view are new works by Govinda Sah ‘Azad’, an artist from Nepal who is known for his paintings of tempestuous skies and cosmic explosions. The works are informed by Sah’s intriguing ongoing metaphysical musings about the nature of reality. Rachid Koraïchi is represented by a selection of works in different mediums, including two striking etchings from the series A Nation in Exile, rendered in a predominately black palette.

The Detroit Institute of Arts will present James Barnor: Accra/London—A Retrospective, a comprehensive survey of the work of British-Ghanaian photographer James Barnor, whose career spans more than six decades. A studio portraitist, photojournalist, and Black lifestyle photographer, Barnor established his famous Ever Young Studio in Accra in the early 1950s and devoted his early photography to documenting critical social and political changes that animated the nation on the cusp of independence from Britain.

For the eleventh edition of 1-54 London, October Gallery presents new works by Zana Masombuka, Alexis Peskine, LR Vandy, paintings by Eddy Kamuanga Ilunga and Owusu-Ankomah and sculpture by Romuald Hazoumè.

Highlights include new works by Zana Masombuka which encompass photography and beaded steel sculpture from her first London solo exhibition at October Gallery, titled Nges’rhodlweni: A Portal for Black Joy (5th – 30th September, 2023). Masombuka draws inspiration from her upbringing in the small town of Siyabuswa, in rural KwaNdebele, South Africa. Her works deploy Ndebele cultural lore, symbolism and material contrast in a radical re-examination of identity, tradition and culture.

Alexis Peskine presents new large-scale, mixed-media ‘portraits’ of the African diaspora, which are rendered by hammering nails of different gauges, with pin-point accuracy, into wood. By applying gold and silver leaf to the nails, he creates striking images that echo the energy reminiscent of the spiritually charged Minkisi ‘power figures’ of the Congo Basin.

Visceral new rope sculptures hand-sewn by LR Vandy are included. The artist’s manipulation of rope holds both historic and symbolic importance, as it was used in ancient construction and the building of empire and colonialism through shipping, and is associated with slavery, captivity and execution.

Also on view is Buana mbutuku buila (Childhood is a Dark Night), a vibrant new painting by internationally acclaimed Eddy Kamuanga Ilunga from the ongoing Ghost of the Present series.

The presentation includes bold paintings by Owusu-Ankomah from his Microcron series which employ Adinkra symbols and are influenced by Akan philosophies. The human figures in the paintings interact within an ocean of emblems that surround and define them.

Romuald Hazoumè is represented by two of his signature mask works. Composed of miscellaneous found materials, these captivating sculptures are witty portraits that often engage with international affairs to deliver insightful social commentary.

Three works by Zana Masombuka will be featured in the group exhibition, COZY – Comfortable in My Skin with Gallery OCA (Of Caribbean Art).

Taking place at Cromwell Place, the exhibition invites you to step into a world of hybrid identities, where power and vulnerability reverberate in conversation and brings together the unique voices of some of Africa, the Caribbean and the diaspora's boldest voices, presenting a multifaceted perspective on womanhood, shaped by the artists’ defining journeys towards self-actualisation.

Work by Aubrey Williams will be shown in 1-54 Presents; a group show titled Transatlantic Connections: Caribbean Narratives in Contemporary Art. This exhibition will be on view at Christie’s, on the occasion of 1-54 Contemporary African Art Fair’s 11th edition. Traversing individual experiences and collective identities, Transatlantic Connections: Caribbean Narratives in Contemporary Art brings together a range of works from some of the most exciting modern and contemporary Caribbean artists of the last 50 years.

Romuald Hazoumè's monumental installation, Rat Singer: Second Only to God! will be exhibited in a bold, new exhibition at Kunsthalle Mannheim.

1.5 Degrees: Interdependencies between Life, the Cosmos, and Technology examines the complex interaction of human beings, nature and technology. Exploring how the climate crisis influences all areas of life, the premise of the exhibition questions whether the methods by which humankind has developed the world since the beginning of industrialisation are still legitimate. Includes works by Anselm Kiefer, Richard Long and Julian Charrière amongst others.

LR Vandy will display a new sculpture outside the International Slavery Museum, which explores storytelling, interpretation and the wider historic waterfront. The work, titled Dancing in Time: The Ties That Bind Us, is handmade by sewing sections of rope and binding the ends with twine. This pop-up installation is part of the International Slavery Museums’ series of activations and will be located beside the dry dock in the public space of Liverpool’s Waterfront.

Listen to an interview with LR Vandy on BBC Radio Merseyside at 8.30 pm on Monday, 3rd April.

We are delighted that Alexis Peskine's film Raft of Medusa will be presented in a new group exhibition at Centre Pompidou-Metz this November. A Gateway To Possible Worlds brings together over 200 works from the late 1960s to the present day and highlights the bonds between imaginary worlds and our reality.

Established in 1896 and organised every three to four years by Carnegie Museum of Art, the International presents an overview of how art and artists respond to the critical questions of our time. The 58th Carnegie International will bring together new commissions, existing works and projects by established and emerging artists working internationally, domestically, and locally. The exhibition will transform galleries and public spaces in the museum and will occupy sites and engage publics in various Pittsburgh neighborhoods.

The following representation of Laila Shawa’s lithographs of the Walls of Gaza II series will be shown: Passages to Freedom, 12th Century AD, Coke is it! and The Sponsors.

Works by Aubrey Williams will be shown at Modern Art in a group exhibition featuring over 40 artists.

Taking its title from a painting by the celebrated American artist Charles Burchfield, The Moth and The Thunderclap aims to show how artists have been compelled to reflect an indeterminate psychological space where nature and culture collide, often filtered through their experience of landscape.

October Gallery is pleased to participate at Art Dubai 2023 for its 16th edition, with a selection of new and recent works by international artists. For the Contemporary section at Booth E12, the gallery brings together striking pieces by El Anatsui, Jordan Ann Craig, Eddy Kamuanga Ilunga and Alexis Peskine. In the Modern section at Booth M6, the gallery will present a solo show of works by acclaimed photographer James Barnor.

Alexis Peskine presents new and recent works for the first time at Art Dubai in their Contemporary section. Peskine creates breathtaking composite images rendered by hammering nails of different gauge, with pin-point accuracy, into wood stained with coffee and mud, followed by applying gold and copper leaf to the nails.

Also on view will be works by El Anatsui, whose metal wall sculptures have provoked a storm of international attention with institutions and audiences over recent years. Anatsui is represented by two vibrant prints from the Circular Series, one in deep blue and the other in gold, that were developed with Factum Arte, Madrid. Alongside these intriguing prints, vivid hard-edged paintings by Jordan Ann Craig will be exhibited which reference the artist’s indigenous Northern Cheyenne culture. Another highlight will be new and recent large-scale paintings by Eddy Kamuanga Ilunga, whose work explores the seismic shifts in the economic, political, and social identity of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, which have been taking place since colonialism.

Alexis Peskine's large-scale mixed media portrait Passage (Iemanjá's Tears)? is displayed at the Foundling Hospital as part of their new exhibition, Tiny Traces.

The exhibition presents a rich history of London life from 1739-1820, with stories of more than a dozen children from the African and Asian diasporas. The works presented form a dialogue with the historical narratives of the hospital, enabling visitors to explore the many emotions arising from the archive and ask questions about the past, present and future.

Museum Sztuki will open a major exhibition, Erna Rosenstein, Aubrey Williams. The earth will open its mouth, showing works by Williams (1926–1990) alongside Rosenstein (1913–2004), a Polish artist of Jewish origin born in Lviv. The works of Williams and Rosenstein are the starting point for reflection on art – challenging history and diasporic identity by finding expression in the language of abstraction and oneiric surrealism.

For the 2022 edition of Abu Dhabi Art, October Gallery will present selected paintings by Govinda Sah ‘Azad’, Jordan Ann Craig, and Aubrey Williams, alongside ceramics and works on paper and canvas by Rachid Koraïchi.

Highlights include recent paintings by Govinda Sah ‘Azad’, an artist from Nepal, who is known for his paintings of tempestuous skies and cosmic explosions.

On view will be striking, reimaged hard-edged paintings by Jordan Ann Craig, which reference the artist’s indigenous Northern Cheyenne culture.

Rachid Koraïchi’s creative explorations have extended across an impressive array of media, which include ceramics, textiles, bronze, corten steel, wood and paintings on silk, paper or canvas. Three blue and white ceramic jars from the Lachrymatoires Bleues series (2020) will be displayed.

Also presented are selected works by Aubrey Williams, whose paintings are being increasingly recognised as a uniquely evolved expression of abstraction in Caribbean art.

October Gallery will participate in the 2022 edition of AKAA Art Fair with a presentation spanning sculpture, works on paper, photographs and paintings by artists, Nnenna Okore, Alexis Peskine, Benji Reid, and Frantz Lamothe.

Highlights include a new dynamic installation in the Carreau du Temple by Nnenna Okore, who will also be in Paris to present a talk at the fair on 21st October, with Claire Staebler, Director of FRAC Pays de la Loire (Nantes) as the moderator. Especially made for the fair, Okore’s large-scale installation includes materials such as plastic bags, yarn and sticks, dexterously interwoven in undulating forms. At the Gallery booth, Okore will be represented by Ethereal Beauty, an intricate work, that reveals an extraordinary manifestation of colour and formation, resembling organic elements in nature. For the Bruges Triennial 2021, Nnenna Okore completed a monumental textile installation, And the World Keeps Turning, in which she stretched PVC fabric around the Poertoren (Gunpowder Tower) in Bruges.

Another highlight is Bwira (Getting Dark), a striking work by Alexis Peskine, made from Moon gold leaf, nails, coffee, and earth. Peskine’s practice addresses questions of the Black Experience and references the Congolese wooden effigies, the Minkisi power figures. Nails, in both ancient and contemporary African cultures, are associated with objects of immense symbolic and spiritual power. The artist is also represented by two remarkable portraits created from coffee infused by ink, screen printed onto handmade paper, surrounded by gold leaf.

On view will be several fantastical photographs by Benji Reid, whose works are primarily composed of self-portraits in eye-catching anti-gravitational poses. Reid seduces the viewer by creating alternative realms of hyper-reality, adorned with a medley of marvelous objects, set against imaginary surroundings. Choreography and photography unite in Benji Reid’s evocative images and his works have been shown in MoCADA (Museum of Contemporary African Diasporan Arts), New York, as part of the 2019 exhibition Styles of Resistance: From the Corner to the Catwalk.

Also presented is Lonely Child, a poignant painting by Frantz Lamothe, whose raw and visceral works reflect fragments of his varied past. Born in Haiti in 1961, Lamothe departed the country at the age of four to spend his childhood in Brooklyn; by the age of sixteen he was living on the streets and painting graffiti in the subways of New York. This way of life came to an end when, along with fellow graffiti artists such as Jean-Michel Basquiat, Lamothe was taken up by the New York gallery circuit. Lamothe’s work has garnered international acclaim across Europe, Japan, and the USA. He lives and works in Paris, France.

To celebrate 1-54’s tenth anniversary at Somerset House, October Gallery will exhibit new works by Eddy Kamuanga Ilunga, Alexis Peskine, LR Vandy, Zana Masombuka and recent sculptures by Sokari Douglas Camp CBE.

Highlights include signature masques bidons (repurposed masks) by Romuald Hazoumè. Composed of miscellaneous found materials, these compelling sculptures are droll portraits that engage with international affairs to deliver a witty social commentary. Carnaval, a solo exhibition of a new body of works by the artist, opens on 6th October at October Gallery and continues until the 26th November, 2022.

October Gallery is proud to present the first international monograph on Eddy Kamuanga Ilunga, published by Rizzoli in October 2022, and will hold a book launch on Friday 14th October at 5pm, Booth W1 at 1-54 Contemporary African Art Fair, London. The presentation will take place surrounded by a display of new and recent works by the artist amongst others. In his work, Kamuanga explores the seismic shifts in the economic, political, and social identity of Democratic Republic of the Congo, which have been taking place since colonialism. Internationally recognized as one of the most interesting young contemporary African talents, Kamuanga’s work has been shown across Africa, Europe, and the United States.

On view will be two new bold ‘hull’ works made by LR Vandy, whose sculptures often allude to the transportation of migrants as commodities. The artist embellishes them with various materials, including fishing floats, porcupine quills and acupuncture needles, transforming them into ‘masks’. Vandy’s work was exhibited as part of the exhibition Get Up, Stand Up Now, in 2019 at Somerset House.

Alexis Peskine will present works from his recent residency in Florence, including a copper leaf nail ‘portrait’ Ikechukwu, created in 2021. This striking workcomprises earth pigment from the river Arno and nails that are meticulously hammered into wood. Peskine often reflects on his own multicultural heritage by making his pieces in a variety of places.

Also on display will be recent sculptures by Sokari Douglas Camp CBE, including Lace and Heels, a dramatic work created for her recent solo exhibition, Jonkonnu Masquerade at October Gallery in June. The artist’s monumental sculpture Europe Supported by Africa and America is on display at the V&A to complement the Africa Fashion exhibition until 14th May 2023.

Recent photographic works will be presented by Zana Masombuka who draws inspiration from her upbringing in the small town of Siyabuswa, in rural KwaNdebele, South Africa. In collaboration with different photographers, Masombuka situates herself as the subject of an ever-evolving practice that explores culture and identity.

Fayre Share Fayre is a group show hosted in the South Gallery at the Whitworth, Manchester. The exhibition brings together over 40 artists with a connection to Greater Manchester and is part of A Modest Show, the collateral programme to British Art Show 9 at the Whitworth, the biggest touring exhibition of contemporary art in the UK.

A work by Benji Reid will be on display.

Radical Landscapes, a major exhibition exploring our connections to the rural landscapes of Britain opens at Tate Liverpool. Work by Aubrey Williams is included.

The exhibition presents rural spaces as sites of artistic inspiration and action, and a heartland for ideas of freedom, mysticism and rebellion. It explores how artists have reclaimed the landscape as a space to make art for everyone, as well as unearth how the countryside has been shaped by our values and use of the land. The show will also consider the human impact on the landscape and ecosystems, by featuring works that reflect on the climate and its impact on the landscape.

The Royal Academy presents the 254th Summer Exhibition, a unique celebration of contemporary art and architecture, providing a vital platform and support for the artistic community. Celebrated British sculptor Alison Wilding RA will co-ordinate this year’s Summer Exhibition, and working with the rest of the Summer Exhibition Committee, will explore the theme of climate. Works by El Anatsui and by Govinda Sah 'Azad' will be presented.

Sokari Douglas Camp CBE's new sculptures are especially created for display at KCAW Art Trail, next to The Design Museum, where her work once stood as part of the Commonwealth Institute. The works can be viewed from the 18th June throughout the summer and during Kensington + Chelsea Art Week from 23rd June to 3rd July.

MASI Lugano presents the largest and most comprehensive retrospective to date devoted to the work of Ghanaian photographer James Barnor.

Organised by the Serpentine Galleries in London, the exhibition documents Barnor’s long career, which encompasses numerous photographic genres, from studio portraiture to photojournalism, fashion editorials and street photography. Through his images, characterised by a direct and a spontaneous approach, his shots recount the social and political changes that marked the recent history of his country and that of London’s African community.

Focusing in particular on the decades from 1950 –1980, the exhibition presents works from the artist’s personal archives, including many unpublished photographs. After MASI Lugano’s venue, the exhibition will be showcased at the Detroit Institute of Arts.

This exhibition revisits the work of Black artists in Scotland through recent collecting.

In collaboration with Mother Tongue — an independent curating duo — the exhibition focuses on showing older works from Glasgow Museums’ collection as well as new acquisitions through the New Collecting Award from the Art Fund. Informed by Mother Tongue’s research, the exhibition reflects on the current and historical presence of Black artists living, working, exhibiting and studying in Scotland. Work by Aubrey Williams forms part of this interesting survey exhibition.

Postwar Modern explores the art produced in Britain in the wake of a cataclysmic war. Certainty was gone, and the aftershocks continued, but there was also hope for a better tomorrow. These conditions gave rise to an incredible richness of imagery, forms and materials in the years that followed.

Focusing on ‘the new’, Postwar Modern features 48 artists, including Aubrey Williams, and around 200 works of painting, sculpture, photography, collage and installation.

This exhibition explores the subjects that most preoccupied artists, among them the body, the post-atomic condition, the Blitzed streetscape, private relationships and imagined future horizons. As well as reconsidering well-known figures, the exhibition foregrounds artists who came to Britain as refugees in addition to female artists who have tended to be overlooked.

Alexis Peskine has been invited by Fondation MAM to participate in an artist's residency.

Located in Douala, MAM was formed with the intention of promoting visual and contemporary art from Africa and the Diaspora.

An exhibition of Alexis Peskine's work will be held at Galerie MAM from 15th April – 15th June 2022.

Barakat Contemporary will present an exhibition of works by James Barnor.

This will be the first presentation of the photographer's work in South Korea.

Homo Faber presents Crafting a more human future in collaboration with the Michelangelo Foundation. The importance of the concept of “crafts” in contemporary society will be explored through the vision of a team of renowned curators and partners.

Three vases from Rachid Koraïchi's Lachrymatoires Bleues (2020) series will be part of the exhibition Next of Europe. These pieces are based on lachrymatory vases, small glass vials that were originally found in ancient burial chambers, were later believed by the Victorians to be ‘tear gatherers’ and used to collect the tears shed at the loss of a loved one. While contemplating the unending wars in Syria, Libya, Yemen and Iraq today, and the endless streams of refugees fleeing their homes in search of a new life in the west, Koraïchi conceived this series as symbolic repositories for the countless uncollected tears spilled because of the individual human tragedies associated with these ongoing events.

This exhibition explores the work of artists from the Caribbean who made their home in Britain, alongside other British artists whose work has been influenced and inspired by Caribbean themes and heritage. Spanning visionary paintings to documentary photography, fashion, film and sculpture, Life Between Islands traces the extraordinary breadth and impact of Caribbean British art, in one setting.

This exhibition celebrates how people from the Caribbean have forged new communities and identities in post-war Britain - and in doing so have transformed what British culture and society looks like today. The exhibition features over 40 artists, including Aubrey Williams, Donald Locke, Horace Ové, Sonia Boyce, Claudette Johnson, Peter Doig, Frank Bowling, Donald Locke, Hew Locke and Alberta Whittle.

October Gallery will participate in the online 2021 edition of FNB Art Joburg Fair. Works by James Barnor, Sokari Douglas Camp, Ablade Glover, Alexis Peskine, Benji Reid and LR Vandy will be exhibited online by October Gallery.

Sokari Douglas Camp first exhibited at October Gallery in 1985. She has had more than forty solo shows worldwide and in 2005, was awarded a CBE in recognition of her services to art. In 2012, her large sculpture, All the World is Now Richer, a memorial to commemorate the abolition of slavery, was exhibited in The House of Commons and then in 2014 at St Paul’s Cathedral, London. The piece is currently on display at until Westminster City Council Offices until January 2022.

In her sculptures, LR Vandy brings together both found and made objects in order to create new meaning. In her ‘Hull’ series, Vandy transforms model boat hulls into ‘masks’, animating them with materials, including fishing floats, porcupine quills and acupuncture needles. The hulls allude to the transportation of migrants as commodities. As masks they present a transformation of identity, drawing upon the tradition of talismans, charms and amulets.

In 2019, the large-scale piece Superhero Cog Woman was part of Frieze Sculpture, London and also installed at Holland Park as part of Kensington and Chelsea Art Week 2021. Her work is in various private collections and was acquired by the British Museum.

October Gallery is participating in the digital version of ART X Lagos Art Fair - online edition.

A selection of works by Ablade Glover, Alexis Peskine and Benji Reid as well as prints by Eddy Kamuanga Ilunga will be exhibited by October Gallery.

Alexis Peskine’s works are large-scale mixed media ‘portraits’ created by hammering gold leafed nails into wood stained with coffee, hibiscus and mud. He depicts figures that portray strength, perseverance and self-possession, with energy startlingly reminiscent of the Minkisi “power figures” of the Congo Basin.

Benji Reid’s breathtaking photographs, comprised primarily of self-portraits in incredible, anti-gravitational poses with a medley of props draw the audience into a different dimension. Reid's work was exhibited in >Get Up, Stand Up Now, curated by Zak Ové, at Somerset House, London, 2019. His work is in the collection of the Harn Museum of Art, Florida, USA. In 2021, October Gallery presented Benji Reid: Laugh at Gravity the artist’s first solo show at the Gallery.

In a career spanning over five decades as an exhibiting artist, Ablade Glover is one of Ghana’s foremost painters. Ablade Glover’s paintings celebrate his passion for the colours and energy of Ghana. From bustling markets to trees bursting with yellow leaves, Glover’s paintings glow with movement and colour. October Gallery has exhibited the work of Glover since 1982. His work can be found in many important public and private collections worldwide.

Eddy Kamuanga Ilunga explores the shifts in the economic, political and social identity of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. His highly sought after compositions possess a depth of historical understanding, with a striking interplay of the intensity of space juxtaposed with emptiness.

As part of Expression(s) décoloniale(s) #2 at Château des ducs de Bretagne works by Romuald Hazoumè have been installed in the courtyard of the castle and in several rooms of the museum.

For this second edition of Expression(s) décoloniale(s) visitors are encouraged to question their views by encountering a variety of historical discourses on the Atlantic slave trade and slavery. Romuald Hazoumè’s works create an uninterrupted dialogue between the past and the present.

October Gallery will participate in the 2021 edition of AKAA Art Fair. The presentation will include photographs by James Barnor and Benji Reid as well as works by Alexis Peskine, LR Vandy and Rafael Trelles alongside prints by Eddy Kamuanga Ilunga.

In 2020, James Barnor received an Honorary Fellowship from The Royal Photographic Society. The following year the Serpentine, London, presented James Barnor: Accra/London - A Retrospective. Also in 2021, James Barnor – Ghanaian Modernist was on display at Bristol Museum & Art Gallery as part of Bristol Photo Festival.

Rafael Trelles’ oil paintings explore humankind’s ever-changing relationship with the natural world and the intricate web of interdependencies humans share with the plants and animals of their surrounding environment. The works exhibited at AKAA are part of the artist’s Axis Mundi series.

New works by LR Vandy will be exhibited as well as works by Alexis Peskine and Benji Reid.

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The Serpentine presents a major survey of October Gallery represented photographer James Barnor, whose career spans six decades, two continents and numerous photographic genres through his work with studio portraiture, photojournalism, editorial commissions and wider social commentary.

Born in 1929 in Ghana, James Barnor established his famous Ever Young studio in Accra in the early 1950s, capturing a nation on the cusp of independence in an ambiance animated by conversation and highlife music. In 1959 he arrived in London, furthering his studies and continuing assignments for influential South African magazine Drum which reflected the spirit of the era and the experiences of London’s burgeoning African diaspora. He returned to Ghana in the early 1970s to establish the country’s first colour processing lab while continuing his work as a portrait photographer and embedding himself in the music scene. He returned to London in 1994.

Free entry but booking required.

This display, curated by Mariam Rosser-Owen (Curator Middle East), will be the first exhibition ever staged on this subject.

Complementing the V&A’s internationally important collection of historical ceramics from the Middle East and North Africa, this exhibition feature works by a selection of the key artists practising today in the Middle East and North Africa, or in diaspora, who use ceramic as a medium of artistic expression. The display will include works by Rachid Koraïchi.

1-54 will hold its ninth edition of the London fair at Somerset House from 14th – 17th October 2021, with VIP Previews on 14th and 15th October. Works by James Barnor, Eddy Kamuanga Ilunga, Frantz Lamothe, Alexis Peskine, and LR Vandy will be exhibited by October Gallery.

The Gallery will also, for the first time, present works by Frantz Lamothe at 1-54. Also on display will be new works by LR Vandy including an incredible new work which is based on the artist’s Dynamo Woman series.

October Gallery will participate in Investec Cape Town Art Fair very first digital event and online viewing rooms taking place from 17-19 September 2021 (Preview days 15-16 September by invitation only).

Running in parallel with their sister fair in Milan; miart international modern and contemporary art fair, this event provides a unique opportunity where VIPs, galleries, and visitors will have access to a much broader audience across two continents and two fairs.

Featuring work by James Barnor, Sokari Douglas Camp, Naomi Wanjiku Gakunga, Alexis Peskine, Benji Reid, Rafael Trelles and LR Vandy.

October Gallery will participate in the 2021 edition of Photo London. This will be the first time the Gallery is exhibiting at the major international photography fair. Works by James Barnor, Benji Reid, Alexis Peskine and Romuald Hazoumè will be shown by October Gallery.

James Barnor: Accra/London - A Retrospective at the Serpentine, London, continues during the fair. October Gallery’s booth at Photo London will feature works on display at this seminal exhibition. Also included are newly released photographs by artist Benji Reid, whose solo show Laugh at Gravity is held concurrently at October Gallery.

Slavery: Ten True Stories at Rijksmuseum focuses for the first time on slavery in the Dutch colonial period. This exhibition explores 250 years of Netherland's history and the topic of slavery through personal and real-life stories rather than abstract concepts. These are stories from Brazil, Suriname and the Caribbean, South Africa and Asia.

Romuald Hazoumè's monumental installation La Bouche du Roi is a highlight of the exhibition. In 2006 the work was acquired by the British Museum and in 2007 was presented at the museum in collaboration with October Gallery. The piece is a powerful tribute to those who suffered the horrors of the transatlantic slave trade.

Portable Sculpture at Henry Moore Institute brings together work from 1934 to the present day. The exhibition features work by fifteen artists, including Romuald Hazoumè, Louise Bourgeois, Alexander Calder, Marcel Duchamp, Mohamad Hafez, and Do Ho Suh.

The exhibition explores a variety of responses to circumstances in which permanence is difficult to achieve. A combination of unstable geopolitics and sweeping economic change during the twentieth and twenty-first centuries has made questions about home and identity, migration and travel, or stability and impermanence ever more pressing..

This display weaves together a rich tapestry of artistic expression from artists born in, or connected to, countries from Iran to Morocco.

Featuring around 100 works on paper – from etchings to photographs and artists' books – the majority of works in the exhibition have been collected in the past decade. They highlight topics of gender, identity, history and politics, while also exploring poetic traditions and the intersections between past and present. There is no single narrative but a multiplicity of stories. Works by Rachid Koraïchi and Golnaz Fathi will be exhibited.

Africa Reborn, a group exhibition at musée du quai Branly-Jacques Chirac, explores a visual dialogue between contemporary art and ancient African art forms since the end of the 20th century. Curated by professor, curator, critic and art historian Philippe Dagen, the exhibition features No Return (2019), a major new work by Romuald Hazoumè which was created especially for Africa Reborn.

KCAW21 features hundreds of local and digital events taking place, including a dynamic outdoor Public Art Trail across 9 zones from Sloane Square to White City, curated walks through hidden streets of Kensington and Chelsea, Late Gallery Hop, museum projects and more.

A large Jesmonite sculpture from the series Superhero Cog Woman by LR Vandy, acting as a tribute to women throughout time, will be exhibited as part of KCAW21.

Works by Laila Shawa are part of the exhibition 'Inside/Out'. Shawa's ongoing series of silkscreens and prints entitled The Walls of Gaza strive to reflect the political realities of her country, targeting themes of injustice and persecution. This series evolved from photographs taken of graffiti appearing on the houses of Gaza during the first Intifada.

1-54 will hold its seventh edition of the New York fair online from 17th – 23rd May 2021. October Gallery will exhibit works by James Barnor, Sokari Douglas Camp, Naomi Wanjiku Gakunga, Eddy Kamuanga Ilunga, Rachid Koraïchi, Alexis Peskine, Benji Reid and LR Vandy.

1-54 Online, powered by Christie’s, features virtual booths with 360° viewing rooms.

Works by Jordan Ann Craig, Romuald Hazoumè, Eddy Kamuanga Ilunga, Alexis Peskine and Benji Reid will be exhibited by October Gallery.

The booth will feature Sequita (2020) by Alexis Peskine as part of a series of initiatives comprising the tribute to the Vision & Justice Project and Sarah Elizabeth Lewis, Associate Professor at Harvard University, as organised by Frieze New York. The project wrestles with the urgent question of how, in a democracy, the foundational right of representation and the right to be recognised justly, has historically—and is still—tied to the work of visual representation in the public realm.

October Gallery will participate in the 2020 edition of UNTITLED, ART Miami Beach Online Viewing Rooms from 2nd to 6th December 2020. Works by Alexis Peskine, Romuald Hazoumè, Eddy Kamuanga Ilunga, Jordan Ann Craig, LR Vandy and Benji Reid will be exhibited in the virtual booth hosted on the Artland platform.

October Gallery is participating in the 12th edition of Abu Dhabi Art. The virtual fair runs on Abu Dhabi Art’s website from 19th – 26th November 2020. October Gallery is exhibiting new works by Rachid Koraïchi and Govinda Sah ‘Azad’.

October Gallery presents a selection of Rachid Koraïchi’s works created during this past year of global crisis, including three blue and white ceramic vases from the Lachrymatoires Bleues series, one set of seven paintings from the Handkerchiefs of Hope series and one large etching, Le Jardin d’Afrique, along with other works.

In his most recent series, Govinda Sah has looked to the Moon for inspiration. Sah’s work balances traditional Eastern metaphysical insights about the nature of reality with visual realisations that are in accord with the latest formulations of contemporary western science, imagining a cosmos of boundless possibilities.

The touring exhibition Triumphant Scale is the most comprehensive and detailed presentation of El Anatsui’s oeuvre thus far. The exhibition encompasses all media used by the artist in his remarkable 50-year career, focusing on the triumphant and monumental quality of his sculptures, with the signature bottle cap series at the heart of the presentation. Along with these ambitious works, the exhibition includes wood sculptures and wall reliefs from the mid-1970s to the late 1990s; ceramic sculptures of the late 1970s; and drawings, sketches and prints.

October Gallery participated in the 2020 edition of 1-54 Contemporary African Art Fair, London. New works by Eddy Kamuanga Ilunga, Alexis Peskine, LR Vandy and Benji Reid will be exhibited by the Gallery at Somerset House.

The fair will coincide with Alexis Peskine: Fire Figures, at October Gallery, a solo exhibition of new works by the artist.

For this edition of 1-54, LR Vandy has created a new installation which is a continuation of her 'Hull' series.

This year, Benji Reid was announced the recipient of The Wellcome Photography Prize 2020 for the category Mental Health (single image). Reid was awarded the prize for his work Holding onto Daddy a “love note” to his daughter.

Eddy Kamuanga Ilunga was recently announced as one of Apollo Magazine's 40 Under 40 Africa Artists.

Curated by Tiziana Castelluzzo, the exhibition features three new large installations as well as twenty medium and small works which are being shown for the first time. Jukhee creates works from the printed page. Using abandoned and disused books, she cuts and manipulates pages by hand to create magnificent sculptures.

October Gallery is taking part in the 2020 virtual Latitudes Art Fair. We are showing a selections of works by Benji Reid, Eddy Kamuanga Ilunga, Alexis Peskine, LR Vandy and Romuald Hazoumè.

October Gallery, London presented an exhibition of William S. Burroughs’ art, including rarely displayed paintings and sculptures. Burroughs practiced visual art throughout his life, for decades he produced photographs, collages and film, then in his later years he became a prolific painter. This exhibition will address his legacy, showing highlights from the latter part of his career.

The virtual booth explored Burroughs’ interest in the relationship between word and image. Burroughs thought in images and symbols, this is visible in both his writing and paintings. He was influenced by process art, recombinant art, and incorporating text into paintings.

October Gallery presented works by Naomi Wanjiku Gakunga, Eddy Kamuanga Ilunga, Alexis Peskine and Benji Reid at the 2020 edition of Investec Cape Town Art Fair.

Celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 Moon landing, The Moon is the UK’s biggest exhibition dedicated to Earth’s celestial neighbour. The exhibition reconnects with the wonders of the Moon through artefacts, artworks and interactive moments, and discovers how it has captivated and inspired us throughout history. Featured prominently in the exhibition was El Anatsui’s Cadmium-Vermillion Eclipse, an intaglio print with collage and chine-collé, produced in collaboration with Factum Arte, Madrid.

The monumental metal work TSIATSIA – searching for connection was installed in the atrium of the stunning Zeitz MOCAA (Museum of Contemporary African Art), in Cape Town, South Africa. El Anatsui won the prestigious Charles Wollaston Award when this immense work first covered the facade of the Royal Academy, in 2013. At 15.6m x 25m, the wall-hanging sculpture is the largest he has made using his bottle top technique.

Get Up, Stand Up Now, curated by Zak Ové was a major new exhibition celebrating the past 50 years of Black creativity in Britain at Somerset House. A group of around 100 interdisciplinary artists showcased work together for the first time, including Alexis Peskine, LR Vandy and Aubrey Williams, in this survey of the Black experience and influence, from the post-war era to the present day.

This major exhibition brought together more than 50 of Odundo’s vessels alongside a large selection of historic and contemporary objects which she curated to reveal the vast range of references from around the globe that have informed the development of her unique work. October Gallery loaned the two-piece installation AG+BA by El Anatsui for inclusion in the exhibition.

October Gallery collaborated with Asia House to display works by two artists in prime space of the renowned Asia House, London. Three photos by Huang Xu were displayed in the entrance lobby and three sections of the large installation Redemption by Jukhee Kwon was displayed through the grand staircase to coincide with the Literature Festival at Asia House.

October Gallery presented works by El Anatsui, Rachid Koraïchi, Romuald Hazoumè, Alexis Peskine and LR Vandy among others at the 2019 edition of Abu Dhabi Art.

October Gallery participated in the seventh edition of 1-54 Contemporary African Art Fair, held at London’s Somerset House. The exuberant booth exhibited works by Romuald Hazoumè, new sculptures by LR Vandy as well as new works by Eddy Kamuanga Ilunga and Alexis Peskine.

Frieze Sculpture returned to The Regent’s Park for three months this summer, featuring works selected and placed by Clare Lilley (Director of Programme, Yorkshire Sculpture Park.) LR Vandy’s large Jesmonite sculpture from the series Superhero Cog Woman was exhibited as part of the sculpture park. Superhero Cog Woman is a tribute to the act of women coming together and making things happen. Each artwork from the series can be constructed from a range of cog-like components, differently configured, adding to its seemingly pragmatic and mechanical nature.

October Gallery participated in the fourth edition of Also Known As Africa (AKAA) Art Fair. The booth featured works by Alexis Peskine, Benji Reid and LR Vandy.

The exhibition brought together some thirty contemporary African artists of 15 different nationalities and opened in Casblanca, from where it is touring to6 countries across the continent. Included in the Casablance leg of the exhibition was the bottle-top work Iris by El Anatsui.

The Harley Gallery exhibited new works in an exciting solo exhibition by Sylvie Franquet. Enthralled by views on gender and nature, the artist collects materials brought together in an act of repairing humankind’s relationship with nature. Her punk aesthetic encompasses a range of fine art practices including needlework, sculpture and collage which she combined with research into Welbeck’s historic art collection.

October Gallery exhibited for the first time at 1-54 New York. New works were displayed by artists Eddy Kamuanga Ilunga, Alexis Peskine and LR Vandy.

At the 7th edition of Cape Town Art Fair, 2019, October Gallery presented works at Booth C14 by artists El Anatsui, Eddy Kamuanga Ilunga, Alexis Peskine and LR Vandy.