…and thus concludes the second full year of the London Art Roundup. Looking back on everything I accomplished, it’s kinda crazy to think I was worried about a sophomore slump. Practice makes perfect, and I’m really pleased with the way my writing has developed. But the only way to do that is to write, write, write. And the only way to do that is to go find shows to write about. Lots and lots of shows. LOTS!

850 shows seen*

405 venues visited

254 mini-reviews

54 full length show reviews

11 full length venue reviews

3 interviews

1 sponsorship**

Now I suspect that many of you probably want to know which ones were my favourites. Yes, I have that list. No, I’m not going to publish it. Unlike movies or music or TV shows, there’s never gonna be another chance for you to see those art shows again. You either saw them or you didn’t, so what does it matter if someone else thought it was amazing when you yourself missed it? The only thing that matters is that you go see some art. Any art. Just go.

That being said, a full list of all my reviews is below. Just in case you want to read what I thought, or to see if you agree with me about the shows you did see. The fire icon 🔥 indicates Top Ten most read reviews, based on site stats. How many did you see?

Hint: Be sure to scroll all the way to the end for some final thoughts.

Art Show Reviews

A Strange Loop (musical)(Barbican Theatre)

Alvaro Barrington - Grandma’s Land (Sadie Coles)

An Edible Family in a Mobile Home, 2023 (Tate Britain)

Antony Gormley - Body Politic (White Cube)

🔥 Beyond the Streets London (Saatchi Gallery)

Chris Ofili - The Seven Deadly Sins (Victoria Miro)

City & Guilds Foundation Show 2023 (Kennington)

City & Guilds MA Show 2023 (Kennington)

🔥 Clarke Reynolds - The Power of Touch (Quantus Gallery)

🔥 David Hockney: Bigger & Closer (not smaller & far away) (Lightroom)

Dear Earth: Art and Hope in a Time of Crisis (Hayward Gallery)

Devon Turnbull / OJAS : HiFi Listening Room Dream No.1 (Lisson Gallery)

Differently various (Barbican Curve)

Erotic Art Exhibiton (Bargehouse OXO Tower)

🔥 Fantasy: Realms of Imagination (British Library)

France-Lise McGurn - Hostess (Simon Lee)

Francesca Gabbiani - Hot Panoramas (Cedric Bardawil)

Friends and Relations (Gagosian)

Hamid Yaraghchi - Let The Wound Lie Open (Beers London)

Herzog & de Meuron (Royal Academy)

In Case of Emergency (Southbank Centre)

Inside (Two Temple Place)

Jiro Osuga - Depatures (Flowers)

Joseph Yaeger - Time Weft (The Perimeter)

Julian Opie - OP.VR@LISSON/London (Lisson)

Keith Clapson - Touching the Surface (Bethlem Gallery)

Laetitia Yhap - Keeping Company (Hales)

Lagos, Peckham, Repeat: Pilgrimage to the Lakes (South London Gallery)

Lisa Brice - Bar Games (Sadie Coles)

Lisetta Carmi - Identities (Estorick Collection)

Lucy Sparrow - Feltz Bagels (NYC pop-up)

Meat Market #1 (Deptford)

🔥 Mike Nelson: Extinction Beckons (Hayward Gallery)

Mohammed Sami - The Point 0 (Camden Art Centre)

🔥 Moonwalkers: A Journey with Tom Hanks (Lightroom)

No Place Like Home (Museum of the Home)

Outdoor Sculpture Trails - 2023 (various London)

Paula Nadal - Poolside (Haricot Gallery)

Paula Rego - Letting Loose (Victoria Miro)

Pope.L: Hospital (South London Gallery)

🔥 RCA Graduate Show 2023 (RCA Battersea)

Sandcastle (APT Gallery)

🔥 Science Fiction: Voyage to the Edge of Imagination (Science Museum)

Serena Huang (Mandy Zhang Art)

Shiva Ahmadi - The Courage of Eve (Rosenfeld)

STATE-LESS 無國界 (Two Temple Place)

The Drawing Year 2023 (The Royal Drawing School)

🔥 The Fans Strike Back (S. Kensington)

This is New York (New York City, USA)

Through the Looking Glass (Mall Galleries)

Tim Lewis - The Forest Visits (Flowers)

Tom de Freston - Small Worlds (No. 20 Arts)

uMoya — Liverpool Biennial 2023 (Liverpool)

Why We Linger (Derbyshire Framers)

Interviews

Benjamin Rhodes (Shoreditch)

Gallery No.32 (Bexley)

Keith Clapson - Touching the Surface (Bethlem Gallery)

Venue Reviews

À Table — Serpentine Pavilion 2023 (Hyde Park)

Chaplin’s World (Vevey, Switzerland)

The City Model & The London Centre (Guildhall)

Gilbert & George Centre (Spitalfields)

Lightroom (David Hockney show) (King’s Cross)

🔥 Frameless (Marble Arch, London)

Polar Museum (Cambridge)

Southampton’s Titanic Story @ Sea City Museum (Southampton)

Tudor House & Garden (Southampton)

Van Gogh House (Brixton)

Wonderpass (Marylebone)

Click here to scroll through all my venue reviews and get in touch if there are any missing venues you’d like me to review.

Weekly Roundups

Each Monday I publish a list of recent shows I’ve seen that I think are worth seeing. This year, that meant 254 mini-reveiws with about 1,500 photos — but only 47 shows were lucky enough to grace the covers. How many do you recognise?

You can click this to browse a filtered list of Roundups, but if you’re wondering whether a specific show, artist or gallery made one or more mentions, it might be easier to do a Search.

Why I Like It

I launched this series in August 2022 as an opportunity to be completely biased and shamelessly unfiltered in my love for specific works of art. The first column was about Piet Mondrian’s Composition C (No.III) with Red, Yellow and Blue (1935). Would you believe that it still gets read at least twice a day, every day, by someone somewhere in the world? In fact, many of the columns in this series get new reads each week, since a lot of the works I’ve written about are currently on display in public museums and galleries. How many have you seen?

Jan — The Cornershop (2014), Lucy Sparrow

Feb — Mattresses (2013-2014), Kaari Upson

Mar — Black Square (2003), Gillian Carnegie

Apr — Stacked Sill (2022), Harriet Mena Hill

May — Human Frailty (c1656), Salvator Rosa

Jun — Babel (2001), Cildo Meireles

Jul — Red Radish / Scalion (2012), Jen Violette

Aug — Self (2001), Marc Quinn

Sep — Fire! Fire! (1963-4), Enrico Baj

Oct — Acre of Green (2007), Nathan Slate Joseph

Nov — The Rose (1958-66), Jay DeFeo

Dec — The London Mastaba (2016-2018), Christo

Why I Like It will continue in 2024.

Most importantly…

Art is my happy place. The minute I step inside a museum or gallery it’s like a switch has been flipped in my head. Whatever happens to be swirling around in there gets pushed aside and I become fully and totally focussed on the art. Even if it’s bad art! That’s why I see so many shows, why I love writing about them, and why I love to share the good ones with my readers. I want everyone to be inspired, energised or simply see something that might stick in their heads long after they’ve left the gallery.

I recently received an unprompted Thank You from one of my readers that made me smile from ear to ear. It very nicely sums up why I do what I do, and I wanted to share it with you:

“Happy Winter and thanks for the gallery tips and reviews. Sometimes you point out shows I did not know about and sometimes you highlight a show I thought I wanted to see but decide it's not for me and I'll spent my time elsewhere.” — Sarah in Kent

If you know someone who likes art, or London — or both! — please share this site and the Instagram so they can benefit too.

Thank you for reading.

Darren

PS — Here’s a link to my 2022 Roundup Roundup in case you wanted to see what I wrote about last year.

FOOTNOTES:

* Between 03 Jan and 16 Dec I attempted to see 884 shows. Unfortunately, 22 venues were unexpectedly closed when I arrived. I also subtracted the dozen shows that I returned to for a second viewing. Hence 850.

** London Art Roundup was proud to be one of the sponsors for the book ‘Artists’ by Brynley Odu Davies (@brynley.odu.davies), published by Trolley Books.

🔥 Technically, the Outdoor Sculpture Trails - 2023 page was the most viewed page on my site, by far! But it’s also technically not a single show review, as it’s constantly updated throughout the year.

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