Silka Rittson-Thomas' London Gallery Weekend

John Akomfrah: The Unintended Beauty of Disaster at Lisson Gallery

A long-standing fixture in London’s contemporary art scene, Lisson Gallery is currently displaying the most recent works of renowned filmmaker and artist John Akomfrah. Akomfrah’s work is characterised by an ethical and emotional impetus to reflect on our collective consciousness – be it the existential threat of ecological disaster, exploring Black British identity and post-colonialism, or giving voice to minority communities. 

On view is a monumental new three screen video installation alongside a series of new photo-text works. Featuring footage filmed over the past year, this new body of work responds directly to the events of 2020, most notably the Black Lives Matter protests and demonstrations against imperialist monuments, presenting a rethinking of historical narratives. The exhibition also include the UK premiere of the three-screen film, Four Nocturnes (2019), originally shown at the inaugural Ghana Pavilion at the 58th Venice Biennale in 2019.

Peter Fischli at Sprüth Magers

Tucked away on Grafton Street, Sprüth Magers dedicates itself to curating groundbreaking modern and contemporary art. Its long term collaboration with Peter Fischli is testament to this. Fischli carefully observes and draws from the everyday world to create sculpture, installation, video and works on paper that address similar concerns to those explored as part of his collaborative practice with David Weiss (1946-2012). His ongoing interest primarily focuses on the often overlooked, quotidian aspects of everyday life which he reworks in an experimental and humorous way. Often using simple or conventional materials, his works raise questions about the nature of art and our existence in the world by shifting the meaning and reading of things.

Sheila Hicks: Music To My Eyes at Alison Jacques

The highly anticipated exhibition by the grand dame of textural practice, Music to My Eyes responds to Hicks’s lifelong relationship with colour and thread. Throughout her 70-year career, which continues to flourish, the Nebraska-born, Paris-based artist has endeavoured to bestow upon fibre an independent voice, allowing form, colour and texture to dictate its own progression through space.

Kapwani Kiwanga: Cache at Goodman Gallery

For Cache,  the Franco - Canadian conceptual artist Kiwanga has created a series of formal sculptures and installations that continue her interrogation of history, power and resistance. By layering narratives and myths, Kiwanga considers how various natural materials become witnesses to history. 

The exhibition marks Kiwanga’s first solo exhibition in the United Kingdom since her debut at South London Gallery in 2015. Considered one of the most acclaimed artists of her generation, Kiwanga was recently awarded the prestigious Prix Marcel Duchamp Prize for her sculptural series, Flowers for Africa. 

Katherine Bradford at Campoli Presti/ 34 Bourdon St

Away from their usual space in East London, Campoli Presti inaugurates a new series of exhibitions with NY painter Katherine Bradford. Her paintings are celebrated for being simultaneously representational and metaphorical. Set against a vivid and colourful backdrop intersected with geometrical shapes, the figures in Bradford's recent paintings address the nature of social interactions through incongruous, dream-like scenes. Central in this series are the works that explore the archetype of the mother and the expectations they convey as a nurturing, selfless carer who protects and provides.

Martine Syms: SOFT at Sadie Coles HQ

SOFT,  comprises a recent series of archival photographic prints and a new body of drawings on paper by the  LA based, American artist. Acting as an analogue counterweight to the archival photographs, the drawings have a corresponding sense of immediacy and intimacy; each depicts either a subject drawn from the artist’s life or a self-portrait. Throughout, the understated representation of these studies evoke the boundaries between the private and public self, gesture and interpersonal communication, themes that resonate with the foundations of Syms’ practice.

Sarah Rapson: Tiny Trip at Modern Art

Modern Art hosts Dorset-based artist Sarah Rapson’s first exhibition in London. Rapson’s work - spanning painting, photography, video, drawing and collage - is made slowly and thoughtfully with a careful and contemplative eye to her chosen materials. Her paintings are made and remade from what she has at hand: house paint, tape, string, discarded packing boxes... Attention is given not only to the painterly qualities of these materials but also to their historical precedents in the canon of Modernist painting.

Abbas Zahedi: 11 & 1 at Belmacz

Founded in 2000, Belmacz is a contemporary art gallery nurturing both emerging and established artists. For 11 days only, the gallery will undergo a transformation to showcase the way British Iranian born artist Abbas Zahedi cleverly works with, and through, space.  Following Zahedi’s recent solo exhibitions How To Make A How From A Why? (South London Gallery, 2020) and Ouranophobia SW3 (2020–21), 11&1 can be seen as a formative point of becoming in Zahedi’s exhibitionary praxis. Zahedi bends space, expanding what is seemingly known, in order to allow something a/effective to happen

Bridget Riley: Past into Present at David Zwirner

Spanning three floors of a beautiful Georgian townhouse, this contemporary art gallery is currently home to Bridget Riley’s signature optical art. Over the course of her six-decade career,  the prestigious of op art painter Riley has frequently returned to earlier compositions in order to further her continued investigation of colour, form and visual perception. Spanning three floors of the gallery, the exhibition features new and recent paintings from Riley’s Intervals, Measure for Measure and Static series.

Patricia Leite: Caninana at Thomas Dane Gallery

For her inaugural exhibition at Thomas Dane Gallery, Brazilian painter Patricia Leite presents a new series of oil on wood paintings informed by the landscape of São Paulo’s Barra do Una. Leite’s paintings frequently involve the layering of pigment to ruminate on temporal and evanescent states such as qualities of light, ephemeral atmospheres and momentary sensations. In this new body of work, Leite examines a particularly biodiverse ecosystem, portraying the abundant flora, fauna, waterfalls and seascapes of the region.