A profusion of kaleidoscopic colours, hypnotic shapes, and an eye-catching message in bold capital letters: Lakwena’s work immediately grabs attention. With text as the central element of her visual, London-based Lakwena, who is from British and Ugandan heritage, signs the first typographic poster in the festival’s history. The work revolves around five words – ALL YOU SEE IS GLORY – a short, impactful message open to various interpretations.

This phrase is taken from the lyrics of the song “Stars,” composed by Janis Ian in 1974 and performed by Nina Simone at Montreux in 1976. During her research on the Festival, Lakwena was immediately captivated by Simone. This emotionally charged performance – where Simone famously ordered a woman to sit down – is one of the most iconic moments of her career, and also featured in the documentary What Happened, Miss Simone?

I was researching the Festival and I found out about Nina Simone’s 1976 performance. It’s so incredible, so moving, the intimacy, it felt really raw, very real.

Lakwena

“The word ‘GLORY’ reflects the legacy of the Festival, its legendary concerts, and the beauty of the lake and mountains. But this message can also be interpreted in different ways. There’s a certain melancholy too, as the song “Stars” is mainly about the fleeting nature of fame. I think it’s a really grounding concept and a nice contrast to our culture’s obsession with fame. Glory can be passing, fleeting and brief, but it is beautiful.”

Montreux Jazz Festival: A Tradition of Creative Freedom Since 1967

Since 1967, the Festival has given Swiss and international artists full creative freedom to design its official poster. In 1982, Jean Tinguely left an indelible mark that became the Festival’s recognizable logo. Keith Haring designed three versions in 1983, then collaborated with Andy Warhol in 1986. David Bowie took part in 1995, followed more recently by Yoann Lemoine (Woodkid), Malika Favre, Christian Marclay, Tomi Ungerer, JR, and Rylsee.

About Lakwena

A London-based artist of British and Ugandan descent, Lakwena is known for her use of vibrant colors and powerful texts, creating a world that is both optimistic and subtly subversive. Her paintings, installations, and murals draw inspiration from shared daily experiences and popular culture, including music, fashion, and basketball.

With messages of hope, Lakwena explores a utopian vision imbued with freedom, through a self-taught and instinctive approach. Her works have been exhibited worldwide in cities such as London, Paris and New York, aswell as in prestigious institutions like the Tate Modern, Southbank Centre in London, and Yorkshire Sculpture Park, and she has collaborated with The BRITs, Fiorucci and MINI.

©2024 Montreux Jazz Festival

Art Plugged

Art Plugged is a contemporary platform inspired by a relationship with the broader arts communities. We provide our audience with curated insight into the world of art, from exhibitions to artist interviews and more.

For his first solo presentation with Hauser & Wirth in New York City, Gary Simmons will introduce a new body of work advancing his decades-long exploration into issues that haunt our national psyche––race, representation and collective identity. ‘Thin Ice’ debuts sculpture, paintings and drawings––including a sequence of canvases that isolate and re-purpose archetypal racialized imagery from cartoons of the 1920s and early 1930s, and a site-specific wall drawing referencing one of the most iconic films of the 1960s––to capture the instability and disorientation of the current American moment.

Simmons’ art skates deftly between abstraction and representation via his signature technique of erasure. This formal conceit upends the viewer’s sense of certainty; by degrading familiar icons, he exposes latent meanings and ugly truths lurking just behind the surface of popular imagery. For example, Simmons has consistently used Bosko and Honey, a pair of racist cartoon characters first created in 1928, as avatars of institutionalized racism.

Bosko reappears in ‘Thin Ice’ but with a new and unmistakable urgency. The exhibition opens with a painting that depicts him as a fiddle player frenetically sawing away at his strings. This work signals the start of a performance that will unfold across several successive canvases in which Bosko glides on ice skates to execute a single disjointed pirouette. Together the works achieve the effect of a stop motion film or comic strip. Simmons has blurred the contour lines of Bosko’s whirling figure, an expressive tactic that induces a vicarious sense of dizziness in the viewer.

‘Somewhere, My Love,’ Simmons’ new monumental wall drawing, is his first major site-specific work in New York since his commission for The Drawing Center in 2018. Conceived specifically for this exhibition, it alludes to the unique material history of David Lean’s Academy Award-winning epic ‘Doctor Zhivago’ (1965). Essentially an historical romance, Lean’s classic film recounts the vertiginous mix of idealism, duplicity and dislocation created by the Russian Revolution and subsequent civil war. Simmons’ site-specific work adopts one of the film’s most memorable visuals––a lavishly ice-encrusted palace.

Though its narrative is set in pale, frozen locales during World War I, ‘Doctor Zhivago’ was, in fact, filmed primarily during a winter heat wave in a staged Potemkin village erected near Madrid, Spain, where beeswax and dust from a local marble quarry were repurposed as imitation snow and ice. For Simmons, that feint becomes a stand-in for the artifice and seductive deceit coursing through popular culture and media––and, sometimes, by design, in art itself.

‘Thin Ice’ will also unveil a set of studies that offer glimpses into Simmons’ associative gestural processes, and a new sculpture replete with its own unique set of conceptual and physical paradoxes. Constructed from steel, foam and polyurethane, and finished with automotive paint, ‘Black Frosty’ (2024) resembles a snowman cast in obsidian or coal, his neck ensnared by a 20-foot-long, noose-like, hand-knit scarf made of white wool, suggesting an underlying violence often masked by civility.

An adjacent large-scale painting depicts a constellation of black stars streaming across a hazy blue and white sky, mirroring the inverted color palette of Simmons’ snowman. Here, the heavens are punctuated by points projecting the absence of light and ‘Black Frosty’ remains frozen in time, forever on the verge of dissolution.

Gary Simmons: Thin Ice opens on the 2nd of November, 2024 until the 11th of January, 2025 at Hauser & Wirth New York

©2024 Gary Simmons, Hauser & Wirth

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Art Plugged is a contemporary platform inspired by a relationship with the broader arts communities. We provide our audience with curated insight into the world of art, from exhibitions to artist interviews and more.

The new immersive show navigates the interplay between imagination and reality, from ancient worlds to modern times, unravelling how storytelling and wonder can help make sense of inner narratives – from joy and sorrow to greed and hope – in order to better understand the world around us.

Artists Riya Mahajan and Ruby Bell’s Moody Monsters artwork began as a workshop with 12-14 year-olds from Kensington Aldridge Academy, where young people crafted clay monsters to reflect different emotions. From the joy of first friendships to their initial encounters with anxiety, by harnessing digital technology, they are brought to life in an immersive playground of imagination.

The new 3-month residency, starting on 25^th October at 1pm, comes as part of an ongoing partnership between FRAMELESS and the Royal College of Art’s Digital Direction MA programme, with the shared goal of platforming emerging talent in the world of digital and immersive art.

Riya Mahajan said, “By personifying feelings and bringing them to life through art, we can help young people nurture positive relationships with their friends, families, and even their own thoughts. Bringing emotions to life encourages children to connect with their feelings, highlighting the importance of making art appealing to kids by offering them an engaging connection to imagined worlds, all while helping them confront their own realities.”

Vivian Li’s chapter, ‘From the Ground / Lost in Synthetic’, takes visitors on a journey through a mythological world, blending traditional narratives with hyper modern content. The re-imagining of the ‘Legend of the White Snake’: a Chinese myth of a white snake looking for the magic reishi mushroom (the mushroom of immortality), invites audiences to embark on a magical journey through the shared challenges that can be observed throughout history and mythology that remain relevant to the modern-day human experience.

Imagined Realities builds on the success of FRAMELESS’ Let’s Talk About Art campaign, inviting children to critically engage with the artworks featured within the galleries. During half term visitors will be able to review the artworks in the galleries to be in with a chance to win a seat at the FRAMELESS Creative Table, as well as a lifetime membership to FRAMELESS.

Access to Imagined Realities will be part of any standard ticket to FRAMELESS, meaning visitors to the show will also have access to the full FRAMELESS experience, embarking on an emotionally charged journey, experiencing 42 immersive artworks from some of the world’s most revered artists including Hokusai and Van Gogh, which have been reimagined in collaboration with BAFTA award-winning VFX studio and FRAMELESS’ Official Production Partner Cinesite, whose previous work includes the Harry Potter and James Bond films.

‘Imagined Realities’ at FRAMELESS is open from:

• Monday to Friday: 11:00 am – 5:30 pm
• Saturday to Sunday: 10:00 am – 6:00 pm
  (last entry at 4:00 pm)
• Frameless Lates (18+ only) is open from:
• Friday to Saturday: 6:00 pm – 10:00 pm

©2024 FRAMELESS

Art Plugged

Art Plugged is a contemporary platform inspired by a relationship with the broader arts communities. We provide our audience with curated insight into the world of art, from exhibitions to artist interviews and more.

For the 2024 edition of Paris Photo, Galerie La Patinoire Royale Bach is delighted to participate in two sectors. In the main sector, in Booth B29, the gallery presents a group exhibition featuring artists working with expanded photography, collage and process-intensive interventions: Gordon Matta-Clark, Carmen Winant, Lebohang Kganye, Lita Albuquerque, Stephen Gill and Rafael Y. Herman. Simultaneously, the gallery highlights Lebohang Kganye’s work in the Voices Sector as part of
Liberated Bodies, an exhibition curated by Azu Nwagbogu.

Curated by Julien Frydman, Galerie La Patinoire Royale Bach’s booth at Paris Photo highlights three artists with innovative practices using collage. Gordon Matta-Clark (USA, 1943-1978), a seminal figure in the 1970s New York art scene, is renowned for his radical building cuts, interventions that transformed architectural spaces into sites of creative disruption. Matta-Clark’s works on view, including collages from his landmark series Splitting (1974) and Conical Intersect (1975), translate his architectural cuts into meticulous, layered photographic compositions, embodying his concept of “anarchitecture.”

His photo-collages encapsulate his vision of exposing hidden layers within neglected urban environments, creating haunting, multidimensional perspectives that echo through contemporary art. The presentation at Paris Photo is concurrent with the major exhibition Gordon Matta-Clark on view through December 21, 2024 at the gallery in Brussels. Matta-Clark has been the subject of major retrospectives at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, The Whitney Museum, New York, Jeu de Paume, Paris and the subject of countless other major exhibitions.

Matta-Clark’s work is represented in prominent public collections, including The Metropolitan Museum, The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, MoMA, and many others.

Alongside Matta-Clark is Lebohang Kganye (South Africa, b. 1990) whose work with cut-outs and sculptural photography infuses her pieces with theatrical dimensionality. Kganye’s practice challenges and reclaims historically oppressive narratives, transforming memory through her unique use of collage and performance. Her layered compositions in Two Stories of (Hi)Stories (2023) draw viewers into complex histories, where Kganye herself steps into the roles of various historical figures, weaving new memories within a contested past.

Through her art, Kganye reimagines postcolonial histories, bringing light, both metaphorically and literally, to the untold stories of her culture. Kganye will hold a major solo exhibition at the gallery in Brussels in 2025. She is featured in the upcoming New Photography exhibition at MoMA, (2025) and was recently awarded the Deutsche Börse Foundation Prize (2024).

The artist has recently exhibited at TATE, The Barnes Foundation, the Art Institute of Chicago, Yale University Art Gallery, The South African Pavilion at the 59th Venice Biennale, and others. Kganye’s work is held in institutional collections including the Smithsonian, the Art Institute of Chicago, Getty Museum, Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Musée d’Art Moderne de Paris, Victoria and Albert Museum, Verbund Collection, Walther Collection, and Carnegie Art Museum, among others.

Galerie La Patinoire Royale Bach at Paris Photo Booth B29 and Voices Sector is on view the 7th of November, 2024 until the 10th of November, 2024 at PARIS PHOTO 2024

©2024 Galerie La Patinoire Royale Bach

Art Plugged

Art Plugged is a contemporary platform inspired by a relationship with the broader arts communities. We provide our audience with curated insight into the world of art, from exhibitions to artist interviews and more.

GR gallery is pleased to present “Enigmatic Glance,” a group exhibition featuring artists Tania Marmolejo, Tatsuhito Horikoshi, Masumi Yamamoto, and TRNZ. This event will showcase 16 paintings, executed with the artists‘ signature techniques with a specific focus on the characters’ facial expressions and gaze. Through ambiguous countenances, the exhibition attempts to convey the magic of a reinterpreted everyday life.

“Enigmatic Glance“ delves into the neutral expression, reinterpreting it as a subtle form of emotional communication. The expressionless face, often the most natural and frequent in everyday life, is presented in this exhibition as a canvas capable of conveying a wide range of meanings. From this perspective, neutrality is not emptiness but a state rich with potential interpretation.

The artists highlight the inherent beauty of stillness and invite curiosity about the emotions or stories that might lie beneath. Through their works, the exhibition reveals the delicate boundary between emotion and calm, offering a glimpse into the hidden rhythms and mysteries of facial expressions.

Tania Marmolejo captures ambiguous female facial expressions characterized by large eyes, aiming to evoke emotional empathy in viewers. Her work invites audiences to connect deeply with the feelings conveyed.

Masumi Yamamoto draws children adorned in ethnic clothing, infusing her illustrations with a mystifying beauty that explores the originality found across diverse cultures. Through her art, she navigates the enigmatic space between the world and her own experiences.

TRNZ seeks to blur the boundaries between two realms by presenting familiar objects in unfamiliar contexts. His work transforms everyday situations through unique gestures, highlighting the distinctiveness of ordinary items.

Tatsuhito Horikoshi focuses on melancholic expressions drawn from memory and imagination, creating poignant portraits of boys and girls that resonate with feelings of nostalgia and reflection. His work, influenced by manga storytelling techniques, captures the subtle nuances of emotional experiences within the context of societal expectations.

Enigmatic Glance: Tania Marmolejo, Masumi Yamamoto, TRNZ, Tatsuhito Horikoshi opens on the 21st of November, 2024 until the 28th of December, 2024 at GR gallery

©2024 GR gallery

Art Plugged

Art Plugged is a contemporary platform inspired by a relationship with the broader arts communities. We provide our audience with curated insight into the world of art, from exhibitions to artist interviews and more.

The 2024 Art for Change Prize challenged emerging artists worldwide to tackle some of the world’s most pressing issues through the theme ‘Tomorrow’ing: Visions of a Better Future.’ With a grand prize of £10,000, the competition offers a platform for artists to envision solutions for a brighter tomorrow and showcase their work at Saatchi Gallery.

This year saw a 56% increase in entries, with 4,667 submissions from 140 countries, and over 53% coming from developing nations across Latin America, Africa, Asia, and Oceania. The six selected winners, representing Mexico, Hong Kong, Australia, Spain, Morocco, and the UK, will present works that explore critical issues such as humanity’s relationship with the Earth, the impact of industry on sustainability, and the hopes and fears for future generations.

The winning artworks span a variety of media including painting, photography, video, and mixed-media installations. Through their art, the winners highlight urgent global issues, offering creative solutions and raising awareness about the challenges of our times.

2024 Art for Change Prize Regional Winners:

• Americas: Paola Boyance (Mexico)
• Asia: Wincy Kung (Hong Kong)
• Australia & New Zealand: Jo Mellor (Australia)
• Europe: Ana Monsó (Spain)
• Middle East & Africa: Hiba Baddou (Morocco)
• UK: Lulu Harrison (UK)

Each winner will receive £2,000, and one overall winner—set to be announced at the exhibition launch on 28 November—will take home an additional £8,000.

Paul Foster, Saatchi Gallery Director, adds: “Congratulations to the regional winners. They’ve shown us again, how artists can rise to the challenge of addressing contemporary events and issues in a creative way. We’re looking forward to an exhibition of diverse winning works later this year that should prove inspirational for all visitors.”

The winners were selected by a distinguished panel of business and creative leaders from M&C Saatchi Group, along with esteemed guest judges from the arts and creative sectors.

The winners’ work will be exhibited at the Saatchi Gallery from 29 November 2024.

©2024 M&C Saatchi Group, Saatchi Gallery

Art Plugged

Art Plugged is a contemporary platform inspired by a relationship with the broader arts communities. We provide our audience with curated insight into the world of art, from exhibitions to artist interviews and more.

Our November exhibition rundown features legendary masters alongside emerging figures reshaping the art world. First up is George Rouy’s Bleed, Part I at Hauser & Wirth London. Rouy presents a new body of work that continues his exploration into collective mass, multiplicity, and movement. The exhibition reflects the emotional extremities of our time, inviting us to contemplate identity and embodiment in our globalised, technologically-driven era.

Next on our list of Five Exhibitions To See In London In November 2024 is David Hockney: Living in Colour at Halycon, showcasing one of the world’s largest collections of Hockney’s graphic works, featuring more than 150 pieces spanning six decades of Hockney’s career, dating from 1961 to 2018, this promises to be a feast for Hockney lovers.

Then, head over to bustling Brixton for one of Britain’s foremost contemporary artists, Frank Bowling‘s Selected Prints at Brixton Library. The exhibition showcases sixteen special edition prints by Bowling in collaboration with DACS and the Sussex-based art publisher King & McGaw. These sixteen giclée prints of Bowling’s masterful abstract paintings, ranging from 1968 to 2020, include his ‘map paintings’ that trace and layer stencils of countries and continents and ‘poured paintings’ where acrylic paint is poured directly onto the canvas.

Next stop on our Five Exhibitions To See In London In November 2024 is American photographer Gregory Halpern’s King, Queen, Knave at HUXLEY-PARLOUR. King, Queen, Knave presents fourteen photographs from Halpern’s latest body of work, photographed over the last two decades, mostly in and around his hometown of Buffalo, New York. The series extends beyond a portrait of place, celebrating the poetic idiosyncrasies of everyday life.

The last stop on our Five Exhibitions To See In London In November 2024 is A Journey through Ancient Inspiration in Modern & Contemporary Art at Mazzoleni, London with Mythology Reinterpreted. The exhibition strives to reinterpret the ancient through the lens of Italian artists Giorgio de Chirico, Salvo, and Giulio Paolini, and Mexican artist Jorge Méndez Blake. Guiding this revaluation of the ancient and drawing us back to the point of inspiration, a series of Roman artefacts will invite us to embark on a journey through the annals of art history while simultaneously demonstrating their continual relevance in contemporary visual culture.

Five Exhibitions To See In London In November 2024

George Rouy: The Bleed, Part I

George Rouy: The Bleed, Part I
​7th October, 2024 – 21st December, 2024
Hauser & Wirth London
​23 Savile Row
​London W1S 2ET

Emerging as a leading figure of the new generation of painters, George Rouy’s debut solo exhibition at Hauser & Wirth London, ‘The Bleed, Part I,’ will present a new body of work continuing his inquiry into collective mass, multiplicity and movement. The second chapter, ‘The Bleed, Part II,’ will follow at Hauser & Wirth Downtown Los Angeles in February 2025. Rouy’s dynamic and signature use of the human figure, vexed with desire, alienation and crisis, speaks to the emotional extremities of our time, resulting in explorations of identity and embodiment in a globalised, technologically-driven 21st Century

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David Hockney: Living in Colour

Halcyon is proud to present one of the world’s largest collections of graphics by David Hockney at 148 New Bond Street. “Living in Colour,” which consists of more than 150 works, is also open at its gallery in Harrods. Spanning six decades of his illustrious career, the works date from 1961 to 2018 and include his iconic pool images, self-portraits, portraits of friends, still lifes, and landscapes.

Hockney’s power lies in his virtuosity as a draftsman and colorist, and his appreciation for the everyday. He paints the world around him with bright, bold colors and a restless desire to experiment, epitomizing American modernist Philip Guston’s definition of art as “serious play.”

As an artist, Hockney has always embraced the latest technological innovations. In the 1980s, he harnessed photocopy machines as part of his practice, and more recently, the iPad, which he uses to capture the world as he sees it — through the technicolor guise of the digital age. Visitors will discover various iPad drawings, providing rich insight into his unique exploration of this new medium.

“Living in Colour” also showcases Hockney’s work in the medium of photographic collage, an area of his oeuvre that is sometimes overlooked but in which he was pioneering. In these works, he experimented with unique perspectives and compositions. The exhibition offers a window into Hockney’s personal life: views of his studios, household objects, portraits of friends, family, and his beloved dachshunds — documenting his life and travels from Yorkshire to California.

David Hockney: Living in Colour
Halcyon
10th October, 2024 – 31st December, 2024
148 New Bond Street
London
W1S 2TR

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Frank Bowling OBE RA: Selected Prints

King & McGaw, the Sussex-based leading art publisher and destination for fine art prints, has partnered with Brixton Library on an exhibition of sixteen special edition prints by Frank Bowling OBE RA, one of Britain’s foremost contemporary artists.

Frank Bowling and DACS – the Design and Artists Copyright Society – began their collaboration with art publishers King & McGaw in 2021. The result is a collection of sixteen giclée prints of Bowling’s masterful paintings ranging from 1968 to 2020.

The collection includes Bowling’s ‘map paintings’ that trace and layer stencils of countries and continents, and ‘poured paintings’ where acrylic paint is poured directly onto the canvas.

Frank Bowling OBE RA: Selected Prints
6th November, 2024 – 31st December, 2024
Brixton Library
Brixton
Oval
London SW2 1JQ

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Gregory Halpern: King, Queen, Knave

Huxley-Parlour are delighted to present King, Queen, Knave, a new solo exhibition of works by American photographer Gregory Halpern, now open at our Swallow Street gallery. The exhibition will present fourteen photographs from Halpern’s latest body of work, photographed over the last two decades mostly in and around his hometown of Buffalo, New York. The series extends beyond a portrait of place, celebrating the poetic idiosyncrasies of everyday life.

Buffalo acts as a vast stage in Halpern’s series, hosting a cast of people, animals and buildings that pass before the photographer’s lens. At times the city feels outsized for its inhabitants: open spaces appear unvisited; a large factory looms over a solitary figure picking flowers in a meadow; snow- covered streets are left unwalked.

In his photographs, Halpern reimagines the city’s abandoned sites and urban landscape. Once a centre of industry, which has since migrated elsewhere, along with half its population, Buffalo has witnessed significant loss, although a quiet resilience and strange sense of beauty remain.

Gregory Halpern: King, Queen, Knave
31st October, 2024 – 30th November 2024
HUXLEY-PARLOUR
3–5 Swallow Street
London
W1B 4DE

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Mythology Reinterpreted: A Journey through Ancient Inspiration in Modern & Contemporary Art

Mazzoleni, London is pleased to present the exhibition Mythology Reinterpreted: A Journey through Ancient Inspiration in Modern & Contemporary Art. Opening on 8 October until 6 December, the exhibition strives to reinterpret the ancient through the lens of Italian artists Giorgio de Chirico, Salvo and Giulio Paolini and Mexican artist Jorge Méndez Blake. Guiding this revaluation of the ancient and drawing us back to the point of inspiration, a series of Roman artefacts will invite viewers to embark on a journey through the annals of art history, while simultaneously demonstrating their continual relevance in contemporary visual culture.

Mythology Reinterpreted: A Journey through Ancient Inspiration in Modern & Contemporary Art
8th October, 2024 – 6th December, 2024
Mazzoleni
15 Old Bond Street
London
W1S 4AX

Learn more

Art Plugged

Art Plugged is a contemporary platform inspired by a relationship with the broader arts communities. We provide our audience with curated insight into the world of art, from exhibitions to artist interviews and more.

Huxley-Parlour are delighted to present King, Queen, Knave, a new solo exhibition of works by American photographer Gregory Halpern, now open at our Swallow Street gallery. The exhibition will present fourteen photographs from Halpern’s latest body of work, photographed over the last two decades mostly in and around his hometown of Buffalo, New York. The series extends beyond a portrait of place, celebrating the poetic idiosyncrasies of everyday life.

Buffalo acts as a vast stage in Halpern’s series, hosting a cast of people, animals and buildings that pass before the photographer’s lens. At times the city feels outsized for its inhabitants: open spaces appear unvisited; a large factory looms over a solitary figure picking flowers in a meadow; snow- covered streets are left unwalked. In his photographs, Halpern reimagines the city’s abandoned sites and urban landscape. Once a centre of industry, which has since migrated elsewhere, along with half its population, Buffalo has witnessed significant loss, although a quiet resilience and strange sense of beauty remain.

Eschewing the straightforward approach of traditional documentary photography, Halpern seeks to encapsulate the contradictions and nuances that coalesce in the quotidian. In his compositions, the ‘ugly’ and the ‘beautiful’ coincide: a gable-roofed house is mirrored by its abandoned counterpart that leans precariously towards it; nature reclaims the hollowed out shells of disused spaces and the mundane is transformed into the otherworldly.

Time moves cyclically through the work, slowly unfolding across seasons as palettes of white and grey subside to warmer tones. Stretching time in this way, Halpern’s photographs probe the slippages between entropy and renewal, discerning an inherent hopefulness in our ability for regeneration.

Gregory Halpern: King, Queen, Knave open on the of 31st October, 2024 until 30th November, 2024 at HUXLEY-PARLOUR

©2024 HUXLEY-PARLOUR

Art Plugged

Art Plugged is a contemporary platform inspired by a relationship with the broader arts communities. We provide our audience with curated insight into the world of art, from exhibitions to artist interviews and more.

Gallery 1957 proudly presents Keeping Time, curated by Ekow Eshun and Karon Hepburn. The exhibition opens on the 26th of October in Accra. Keeping Time is a group exhibition that significantly brings together both international and Ghana-based artists from the African diaspora, exploring notions of Blackness, being, and time.

By presenting artworks that are both dream-like and speculative, abstract and figurative, the exhibition questions and disrupts our sense of being in the world through African diasporic perceptions of time.

Keeping Time is presented as a sequel to Gallery 1957’s monumental 2023 group show, In and Out of Time, curated by Ghanaian-British writer and curator Ekow Eshun. The exhibition is a highlight of Accra Cultural Week, taking place from the 24th to the 28th of October 2024—a series of interconnected, intimate, and public events encouraging deeper engagement with Ghana’s vibrant contemporary art scene, spearheaded by Gallery 1957.

The show introduces artists who are exhibiting with Gallery 1957 for the first time, such as Okiki Akinfe, ruby onyinyechi amanze, Alvaro Barrington, Winston Branch, Kenwyn Crichlow, Kimathi Donkor, Ibrahim El-Salahi, Lyle Ashton Harris, Andrew Pierre Hart, Che Lovelace, Sola Olulode, Sikelela Owen, Ravelle Pillay, Elias Sime, Lina Iris Viktor, and Michaela Yearwood-Dan. It also features returning artists such as Gideon Appah, Rita Mawuena Benissan, Amoako Boafo, Phoebe Boswell, Godfried Donkor, Modupeola Fadugba, Julianknxx, Arthur Timothy, and Alberta Whittle.

Perhaps it can be said of all artworks that they affect our perception of time. But in the case of an exhibition of Black artists taking place in Africa, context becomes a significant factor. This exhibition proceeds from an awareness that the experience of time is often a reflection of power relations between societies.

In the Western imagination, people of African descent have historically been seen as the antithesis of Western modernity—considered savage where the West is civilized, ignorant instead of rational, and underdeveloped rather than advanced. Under colonialism, the human-centered perceptions of time that were commonplace in Africa before European presence were subsumed within Western structures of industrial time and order. Indeed, the subjugation of indigenous peoples and their knowledge systems was taken as a prerequisite for advancement into the future.

Against this backdrop of chronopolitics and colonial imposition, Keeping Time explores how the work of artists invites looser and more lyrical readings of time. Conceived as a follow-up to In and Out of Time, the 2023 Gallery 1957 exhibition curated by Ekow Eshun, which was founded on a similar skepticism towards linear notions of progress and modernity, Keeping Time presents works that invoke African diasporic perceptions of time as the inspiration for expansive dreaming and possibility.

These works are conjured on the basis of what the scholar Geneva Smitherman defines as “African People’s Time”: Being in tune with human events, nature, seasons, natural rhythms, not a slave to the artificial time of the man-made clock. Being ‘in time,’ in tune with… the general flow of things [not] being ‘on time’.

To “keep time” in music is to synchronize the work of the individual with the ensemble, all the players tied together by the same rhythm, the same tempo, the same sense of attunement. In the context of this exhibition, keeping time is imagined as a collective act of reaching beyond Western binaries of progress and underdevelopment.

To that end, the exhibition weaves together a lattice of conceptual and aesthetic considerations about the experience of time, spanning intergenerational, geographic, and historical contexts. It gathers works that range from abstraction to figuration, created by a multigenerational span of artists. Senior figures such as Winston Branch and Kenwyn Crichlow, born in the 1940s and 1950s, share the space with younger artists like Sola Olulode, Rita Mawuena Benissan, and Okiki Akinfe, born in the 1990s.

The exhibition also showcases paintings by Caribbean-born artists such as Branch, Crichlow, Che Lovelace, and Alberta Whittle in West Africa for the first time, placing them in dialogue with the work of British and Ghanaian-born artists in a shared exploration of Black diasporic cultural identity as “a state of being and a process of becoming, a condition and consciousness located in the shifting interstices of ‘here’ and ‘there,’ a voyage of negotiation between multiple spatial and social identities” (Paul Tiyambe Zeleza).

Additionally, artists such as Godfried Donkor, Arthur Timothy, and Kimathi Donkor explore the absence or marginalization of the Black figure in Western art history, revisiting the past to offer a reframing of presence and memory that situates Black people at the subjective center, rather than the periphery, of historical narratives. The result is a collection of individual works moving in rhythm and attunement to assert the richness and complexity of Black being and Black movement through the world.

Keeping Time: Curated by Ekow Eshun and Karon Hepburn opens on the 26th of October 2024 until the 11th of January 2025 at Gallery 1957, Ridge – Accra, Ghana

©2024 Gallery 1957

Art Plugged

Art Plugged is a contemporary platform inspired by a relationship with the broader arts communities. We provide our audience with curated insight into the world of art, from exhibitions to artist interviews and more.

Since 2014, Art on a Postcard has raised more than £2 million for The Hepatitis C Trust through support from immovable art icons like Damien Hirst, Marina Abramović, Peter Blake RA, Grayson Perry RA, Chantal Joffe RA, Paula Rego, Andrew Cranston, Lubaina Himid, Michael Craig-Martin, Hurvin Anderson and Claudette Johnson among many others in the charity’s signature postcard auctions, which are also considered an unmissable opportunity for spotting new talent as well as acquiring mini-masterpieces by world famous, sought-after names.

“Over the last ten years, Art on a Postcard has become a thriving community. We have dedicated collectors who participate in every auction and passionate artists who contribute each year. Our postcard-sized art has found homes worldwide, remaining affordable even in today’s economic climate. With well-researched auctions and collaborations with respected curators, you can always expect to acquire exceptional quality and significant artwork.” – Gemma Peppé

2024 marks 10 years since Gemma Peppé founded Art on a Postcard to raise funds for the Hepatitis C Trust in response to her own decades-long battle with hepatitis C, at a time when there was little information, support or research available.Both she and her son, infected at birth, would eventually receive life-saving treatment years later fuelling her desire to raise awareness and support others affected by the virus. After hepatitis C testing became available, Gemma led the Trust’s Get Tested campaign.

Art on a Postcard’s 10^th anniversary auction comes at a time when the Hepatitis C Trust is on the cusp of delivering its lifechanging goal of eliminating Hepatitis C by 2030.

The Tenth Anniversary Auction features the provocative Wynnie Mynerva, whose work challenges societal norms around gender and desire and Florine Démosthène, an internationally celebrated artist exploring identity and culture.

The auction also features acclaimed names like Charming Baker, recognised for his darkly humorous, classically inspired works, and Chris Levine, a pioneer of light art, best known for his iconic portraits of HM Queen Elizabeth II.Also contributing is Antony Micallef, known for his powerful expressionist paintings that blur the line between painting and sculpture, Emma Cousin, whocontributes her surreal, vibrant explorations of human experience, while Mali Morris RA offers her luminous abstract pieces that play with complex colour relationships.

Further notable contributors include Stephen Chambers RA, whose patterned, geometric works have been exhibited at the Venice Biennale, and Oona Grimes RA, whose multidisciplinary approach spans drawing, ceramics, and film. Katherine Jones RA, brings her meditative works that blend printmaking and painting, and Mick Rooney RA, his narrative-driven compositions that frequently draw on myth and history. Nathalie Du Pasquier, founding member of the Memphis Group, contributes vibrant experimental pieces that blur the boundaries between painting and object.

Helen Beard adds a fresh perspective with her vivid, textural depictions of intimacy, while David Harrison presents his fantastical and surreal interpretations of the natural world and Roland Hicks brings his meticulous paintings that hover between abstraction and realism.

Bobbie Russon’s contemplative figurative works and Ryan Mosley’s narrative pieces with rich historical references will also be showcased, alongside Emma Richardson’s oil paintings which investigate themes of female desire and transcendence, while Clayton Schiff’s haunting figures offer a quiet reflection on human nature. Plus artist Jessie Stevenson, whose expansive landscapes have recently shown at Berntson Bhattacharjee, and recent RCA graduate Alexis Soul Gray. 

In addition, bidders can look forward to Hayden Kays Pop Art sensibilities, Charlotte Keates compositions inspired by modernist architecture and natural environments, Nana Wolke’s film-like analysis of actual and artificial realities, Adrian Dica’s mixed media works which juxtapose industrial ruins with unexpected elements, and John Stark’s evocative landscapes blending the spiritual and material worlds.

Anne Rothenstein’s delicate, layered oil paintings invite emotional reflection, and Alyson Helyer’s surreal portraits delve into the complexities of human identity. Klodin Erb presents her expressive explorations of gender and identity, while Anna Rock’s fragmented, pattern-rich compositions blur the lines between memory and reality, and Atticus Gordon explores the processes of meaning-making in painting.

Curators of the November auction include longtime Art on a Postcard supporter and Soho Revue founder India Rose James, Jealous Gallery founder Dario Illari, artist and founder of The Bomb Factory Pallas Citroen, The Auction Collective founder Tom Best, Benjamin Murphy and Nick J Smith of Delphian Gallery, and Art on a Postcard founder Gemma Peppé.

The Hepatitis C Trust was started as a small patient organisation. Today, their increasingly ambitious work has evolved to reach over 300,000 people considered “hard to reach” by the NHS with peer-to-peer programmes and help over 15,000 people into treatment. The Trust now expands this model to reach those other complex health needs, including cancer and heart disease, bringing much-needed healthcare to some of the UK’s most excluded populations. This auction will empower the trust to expand its lifesaving work.

As Art on a Postcard enters its second decade, the award-winning charity continues to harness the power of art to drive meaningful change. Established in 2014, and intended to be a one-off secret auction, Art on a Postcard has become one of British art’s most celebrated fundraisers and curators, hosting events in partnership with Photo London, Art Car Boot Fair and The Other Art Fair. Art on a Postcard recently curated the annual Sound & Vision fundraising auction for War Child.

Art on a Postcard auction runs from the 5th November, 2024 until 19th November, 2024

©2024 Art on a Postcard

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