My favourite exhibitions of 2024
One of my favourite things to do is to visit exhibitions. They inspire me to look and think in ways I hadn’t considered before.
In this post I share my favourite exhibitions of the year. I hope you will forgive me for going beyond the scope of photographs to include artists. After all, centuries of art have influenced many photographers (and occasionally the other way round). And in the case of Saul Leiter, his exhibition displayed both his paintings and photographs.
Although, as
pointed out, Van Gogh (more of him later) wrote in a letter to his brother, Theo: "In a photograph, a person's likeness is fixed forever... but to me, painting offers the chance to go beyond that and show something of the eternal."The Charcoal Heads by Frank Auerbach
At the Courtauld Gallery, London.
Visited on 15th February 2024
I have never seen art like this. By drawing, scratching, erasing and repeatedly reworking his charcoal drawings, Frank Auerbach created portraits of such depth I could only stand and look and be awed at how powerful art can be.
Saul Leiter: An Unfinished World
At the MK Gallery, Milton Keynes.
Visited on 26th March 2024.
What a treat. Visiting the most comprehensive survey of his work ever displayed in the UK. Photographs and paintings spanning his entire career with the added bonus of seeing it with my dear friend, Stefan Powell.
The Bradford on Avon Photography Group Annual Exhibition
At the West Barn, Bradford on Avon.
Visited 4th to 6th May 2024.
This is the exhibition I enjoyed most this year. Ok, I’m biased. I’m involved along with a dozen other local photographers. We aren’t a typical photography club. We have no rules or committee. We don’t care which camera or phone you use. We rarely talk about lenses or shutter speeds. It’s the photo and the story behind it that counts. All else is noise.
National Treasures: Caravaggio
At the Ulster Museum, Belfast.
Visited on 15th June 2024.
I like small exhibitions (one of my most memorable experiences was seeing The Last Supper in a refectory in Milan). And so it was here, just two paintings by Caravaggio in one room. ‘The Supper at Erasmus’ and ‘The Taking of Christ.’ Slow art at its best. Taking time to look and absorb the artist’s genius.
Graduate Show
City and Guilds of London Art School.
Visited on 25th June 2024.
Ok, ok. Like my local photo group exhibition, I’m a bit biased. This show included my very talented niece, Issy (in the centre), and her very talented friends.
Monument by Trent Parke
At the Martin Parr Foundation, Bristol.
Visited on 25th October 2024.
My favourite photobook of 2023 has turned into my joint favourite photography exhibition of 2024. I know how lucky I am to have the Martin Parr Foundation in nearby Bristol. His influential role in Magnum means he can tempt some of the greats of contemporary photography to his bijou exhibition space. This series of extraordinary photos are “a portal through which we witness the disintegration of the universe.”
Van Gogh: Poets and Lovers
At the National Gallery, London.
Visited on 11th November 2025.
To see so many of his extraordinary paintings in London may be a once in lifetime opportunity. I will remember this experience for many a year.
If you’d like to read more about this wonderful exhibition,
has kindly obliged.
I hope you enjoyed my little reminiscence of this year’s favourite exhibitions. I already have a few planned in the new year (Electric Dreams at Tate Modern, Tirzah Garwood at Dulwich Picture Gallery and The 80s at Tate Britain). I wonder which will appear in my list for 2025.
In the meantime, I wish you all a happy and healthy new year.
Love Frank Auerbach! Amazing work.
I have really missed visiting art galleries these past couple of years, convinced that I haven't the time or money for many of the things I'd like to have visited. The Auerbach show in particular is one I would have loved to have seen. And the Caravaggio exhibition sounds delightful: to focus on just two paintings when we find ourselves rushing around larger retrospectives. I shared a studio at art school with a student who spent his entire third year recreating The Last Supper from a photo of Caravaggio's painting pinned to one of the few bits of white emulsion wall visible behind his huge canvas. In truth, he spent his entire third year drinking and sleeping, and not painting, but it was always a pleasure to share the space with his half-finished replica painting and that small photocopied print of the original. Happy new year, Andrew!