May 2024 exhibitions: Art shows to leave the house for this month

It’s a new show in a new space for Castor, who recently upped sticks from Fitzrovia and founder Andy Wicks has transformed a grade two listed church, built in the early 19th century in Islington, into the gallery’s new home. Mexican artist Fabian Ramírez reinterprets Christian iconography within the English church. He draws on a traditional encaustic process, combining beeswax, copal, and pigments, then applying heat to transform the images, symbolising rebirth and connecting with the present. Ramírez challenges colonial narratives, exploring the convergence of Indigenous and Spanish cultures in Mexico's religious history. Through his art, Ramírez invites viewers to contemplate the continuous negotiation between past and present, abstraction and time, echoing the syncretism found in Mexican culture.

From April 10 – May 18, 2024 at Castor, London.

Depression, desire, pleasure, pain… and an obsession with the colour blue, playwright Margaret Perry and director Katie Mitchell adapt Maggie Nelson’s 2009 lyrical essay-slash-book Bluets for the theatre stage. Few details have been provided other than it being described as a communion “with artists like Joni Mitchell, Derek Jarman, Andy Warhol and Billie Holiday, blue is their constant companion as they navigate the devastating pain of a life-altering heartbreak”, but that hasn’t stopped be grabbing one of the fast-selling tickets for its five-week run.

Running until June 29, 2024.

Venezuelan, London-based artist Alvaro Barrington has been given the keys to the Duveen Galleries for this year’s Tate Britain Commission. Little details are known except that the site-specific work will address themes of place and belonging, and it will be Barrington’s largest presentation to date.

From May 29 – January 26, 2025 at Tate Britain, London.

Los Angeles-based Arthur Jafa brings large-scale installation, new and recently made paintings, sculptures, and film to New York City for in BLACK POWER TOOL AND DIE TRYNIG, curated by Ebony L Haynes. Black existence in the Western world is examined through personal, political and industrial themes, using deliberate wordplay in its title to prompt reflection on form, resistance, and the nuances of the word ‘black’. At the same time, Gladstone Gallery will also host a solo exhibition of Jafa’s work featuring a new film.

Running until June 1, 2024 at 52 Walker, NYC.

Nine contemporary artists, including El Hoskyns-Abrahall, Julie Maurin, Amber Pinkerton, Penny Slinger, and more, are brought together in Fuego de Tierra (Earth Fire), curated by Bee Beardsworth. Described as “the manifestation of a burning curiosity to explore temporal topography as a site of sacrality, genesis, protest and discovery”, the exhibition will be accompanied by a programme of music, dance, and movement, including Beardsworth herself, James Massiah, among others.

Running until May 17, 2024 at Alice Black, London.

For over five decades, Joan Jonas has collapsed the boundaries of poetry, sculpture, drawing, installation, film, and dance. In Joan Jonas: Good Night Good Morning, MoMA offers the most comprehensive retrospective to date in the US, examining the spectrum of her career, from early experimental works in performance and video to her latest foray into ecological-focused installations.

Until July 6, 2024 at MoMA, NYC.

For four decades, Jeanette Beckman has been documenting subculture, from the early days of punk in London, photographing The Clash and The Sex Pistols to New York City’s hip hop scene – Salt-N-Pepa, Slick Rick, and LL Cool J – to the more recent Black Lives Matter movement, anti-Trump protests, and peace demonstrations for Gaza. In her first large-scale retrospective, Rebels: An Ode to Subversives, Revolutionaries, and Provocateurs, Foam brings her seminal work together, exploring threads such as social justice, political activism, and youth culture, as well as her work with fashion brands from Dior to Kangol.

From 10 May – 8 September 2024 at Foam, Amsterdam

Featuring 300 rare prints by 140 photographers, Fragile Beauty busts open the private collection of Sir Elton John and David Furnish. Exploring the connection between strength and vulnerability, these era-defining images span the 1950s to today and will unfurl over eight sections exploring everything from fashion to activism. Expect works from Nan Goldin to Robert Mapplethorpe, Cindy Sherman, Zanele Muholi, Ai Weiwei, and Carrie Mae Weems, as well as new acquisitions from Trevor Paglen and An-My Lê.

May 18, 2024 – January 5, 2025.

For the first time ever, Beryl Cook and Tom of Finland converge in a double bill highlighting playfulness and political commentary. Unveiling unseen archival materials, the works offer fresh perspectives on gender, sexuality, taste, and class. Beryl Cook, renowned for her vibrant portrayals of everyday life, captures the spirit of Plymouth’s social scene. Tom of Finland’s pioneering depictions of queer masculinity influenced liberation movements and cultural juggernauts like Village People, Freddie Mercury, Jean Paul Gaultier and Robert Mapplethorpe. Both artists hyperrealise the body, celebrating pleasure without shame, while their artistic distribution methods brought their art to diverse audiences beyond the classic white cube.

From May 15 – August 25, 2024.

Entering its final month, curated by writer Ekow Eshun, The Time is Always Now: Artists Reframe the Black Figure, is a major study of the Black figure and how it shows up in contemporary art. Artists like Michael Armitage, Lubaina Himid, Kerry James Marshall, Toyin Ojih Odutola, and Amy Sherald spotlight the Black figure, revealing its multifaceted existence. This exhibition not only surveys its portrayal in Western art but also delves into its absence, exploring the social, psychological, and cultural landscapes shaping these narratives.

Running until May 19, 2024 at the National Portrait Gallery, London.

Judy Chicago rose to fame in the late 1960s by challenging the patriarchal art world and confronting the absence and erasure of women from the artistic and cultural canon. Now, Revelations is her largest London solo exhibition, named after an unpublished manuscript, brings themes of gender, identity, power, and climate justice to the Serpentine. Showcasing archival and never-before-seen artworks, as well as an immersive video installation featuring footage from her seminal fireworks and coloured smoke performances, preparatory studies for “The Dinner Party, Birth Project, and Power Play”, as well as notebooks and sketchbooks revealing her process and research.

From May 23 until September 1, 2024 at Serpentine North Gallery, London.

For over three decades, Lee Miller and Roland Penrose found sanctuary in the Sussex countryside. Their home, known as Farleys, came also to house a personal collection of works from friends such as Pablo Picasso, Man Ray, Max Ernst and Joan Miró, including a sculpture garden. Now, London-based artist Suzannah Pettigrew will exhibit her series The End (For Now) at the former residence of the surrealists. Mining her family film archives, Pettigrew pulls the past into the present to ruminate on memory with photo sculptures, generative poetry, and framed stills. The series will be exhibited alongside a collection of Lee Miller’s photographs from Farleys.

From May 30 to July 14, 2024 at Farley’s House & Gallery, East Sussex. Open to the public on Thursdays, Fridays, and Sundays.

Not one but two mentions this month for London’s Serpentine. But since it’s been over twenty years since Yinka Shonibare CBE had a solo exhibition in London, there’s cause for some extra love. Titled Suspended States, the exhibition reimagines Western symbols, tackling the rise of nationalism and hostility toward foreigners while exploring power’s impact on refugees, public monuments, and colonial legacies.

From April 12 until September 1, 2024 at Serpentine South Gallery, London.