10 art shows to see in March
10 art shows to see in March
By Alice Primrose
Published 1 March 2018
Spring has sprung, and so have many new exhibitions. From an architectural detective agency to a history of cross-dressing, here are some of the best art shows to see this month.
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Another kind of life: photography at the margins
Barbican Art Gallery, London
This group exhibition looks at life on the margins of 20th- and 21st-century society through the eyes of 20 photographers – including Mary Ellen Mark, Dayanita Singh and Diane Arbus. Katy Grannan’s photographs of strangers in San Francisco and Hollywood have only two rules: they must be taken against a white background and the subjects musn’t look at the camera. The artist says of her portraits: “My hope is that you can empathise and maybe even recognise something in someone you wouldn’t usually pay much attention to”.
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Katy Grannan , Anonymous, Modesto, CA (from the series 'The Ninety Nine') , 2010 .
© Katy Grannan, courtesy the artist and Fraenkel Gallery, San Francisco.
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Rachel Maclean: Spite Your Face
Talbot Rice Gallery, Edinburgh
Rachel Maclean’s latest work is a post-truth Pinocchio, a fairytale film of fibs and fallacies inspired by the pervasive power of proven lies in Trump’s election campaign. All characters are played by the artist herself, smothered in gold body paint, blue hair and prosthetic noses. Commissioned for the 2017 Venice Biennale, the opulent film arrives in the artist’s hometown for its UK premiere.
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Still from Rachel Maclean, 'Spite Your Face', 2017
Courtesy of the artist and Talbot Rice Gallery
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Diaspora Pavilion | Venice to Wolverhampton
Wolverhampton Art Gallery, Wolverhampton
Also reconfigured from last year’s Venice Biennale, this installation brings together work by seven artists interrogating the concept of diaspora. Among them is Erika Tan, whose project stitches together the life of Halimah Binti Abdullah, a weaver who was brought to Wembley to perform her craft in the Malayan Pavilion at the 1924 Empire Exhibition. Also on show are susan pui san lok’s shimmering light and sound structures, which evoke the rose-tinted nostalgia and aspiration of migration.
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susan pui san lok , Untitled (West) , 2018 .
shimmer curtain. Installation view at Wolverhampton Art Gallery. Image courtesy the artist and Wolverhampton Art Gallery.
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Counter Investigations: Forensic Architecture
ICA, London
Described by founder Eyal Weizman as “an architectural detective agency”, Forensic Architecture use the tools of spatial design to investigate human rights violations around the world. Their findings have provided damning evidence in UN investigations and international courts, but this isn’t an exhibition of dry report pages. The organisation deftly uses media, models, graphics and film to tell complex stories of drone strikes, detention centres, cafe shootings and – sometimes – justice.
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The Bombing of Rafah, Gaza, Palestine, 1 August 2014 (investigation 2014-2015). Commissioned by Amnesty International. blackfriday.amnesty.org.
Forensic Architecture located photographs and videos within a 3D model to tell the story of one of the heaviest days of bombardment in the 2014 Israel-Gaza war. The Image-Complex, Rafah: Black Friday, Forensic Architecture, 2015
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Under Cover: A Secret History Of Cross-Dressers
The Photographers’ Gallery, London
Found in flea markets, garage sales, junk shops and eBay, the photographs in this exhibition capture the many ways people have been bending gender since the late 1800s. They chart a scattered, hidden, dangerous history of trespassing across the gender spectrum in front of the camera – though often behind closed doors. Also on show at the gallery are the private photo albums of the RA’s own Summer Exhibition coordinator – Grayson Perry – chronicling the blossoming of one of today’s best known cross-dressers.
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French prisoners of war in the German camp Königsbrück. Written on verso ‘Kriegsgefangenen- Sendung’. Germany, circa 1915
© Sébastien Lifshitz Collection. Courtesy of Sébastien Lifshitz and The Photographers’ Gallery
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Tacita Dean at the NPG and NG
National Portrait Gallery and National Gallery, London
In preparation for the RA’s own Tacita Dean exhibition (opening in May), immerse yourself in the artist’s pioneering, poetic work in two other shows this March. At the National Portrait Gallery, get acquainted with her 16mm films of fellow artists – from Julie Mehretu to David Hockney. At the National Gallery, explore her intimate still-life films alongside other works of the genre from across history.
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Tacita Dean , Prisoner Pair , 2008 .
Location photograph. 16mm colour film, silent, 11 minutes.
© Courtesy the artist; Frith Street Gallery, London; and Marian Goodman Gallery, New York/Paris.
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Sondra Perry: Typhoon coming on
Serpentine Sackler Gallery, London
The American artist’s first European solo show takes its name from a JMW Turner painting, which depicts the drowning of 133 slaves by a captain intent on claiming insurance money for goods lost at sea. The exhibition explores how blackness has been imagined and depicted throughout history, using all sorts of digital tools to conjure immersive environments that explore “how blackness shifts, morphs and embodies technology to combat oppression and surveillance throughout the diaspora”, in the words of Sondra Perry. Read more in our interview with the artist.
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Sondra Perry
Courtesy of the artist and Serpentine Galleries
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Lorna Simpson: Unanswerable
Hauser & Wirth, London
Renowned in her native North America, Lorna Simpson’s work explores, in her words: “the notion of fragmentation, especially of the body… We’re fragmented not only in terms of how society regulates our bodies but in the way we think about ourselves”. Her photomontages are cut from her extensive collection of Ebony and Jet magazines, and accompanied in this exhibition by painting and sculpture too.
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Lorna Simpson , Unanswerable (detail) , 2018 .
Found photograph and collage on paper (40 framed photo collages). 670.5 x 304.8 cm approx.. Photo: James Wang. © Lorna Simpson. Courtesy the artist and Hauser & Wirth.
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Her Grace Land by Linder Sterling
Chatsworth House, Derbyshire
From one legendary photomontage artist to another: Linder Sterling has been snipping apart and sticking together everyday media images since the late 1970s, although this exhibition at Chatsworth House is something else entirely. Describing the show as a “sensorium”, the punk artist-in-residence has created interventions throughout the stately home – including sights, smells and sounds inspired by the 500-year history of the house.
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Linder , Untitled , 2017 .
Courtesy the artist and Stuart Shave/Modern Art. Devonshire Collection, Chatsworth.
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Ala Younis: Plan for a Greater Feminist Baghdad
Delfina Foundation, London
For this new project, Ala Younis has focused her investigative practice on women who have influenced Baghdad, as a means to see beyond the city’s male-dominated politics. Celebrated through found materials, documents and oral histories is artist Fahrelnissa Zeid (who had a large solo show at Tate last year), architect Zaha Hadid and writer Balkis Sharara, who helped smuggle her writer-architect husband’s texts out of Abu Graib when he was imprisoned there.
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Installation view of ‘Plan for Feminist Greater Baghdad’ by Ala Younis at Delfina Foundation, London
Courtesy Ala Younis and Delfina Foundation, London
Read more
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