The London art exhibitions for 2025 have been announced and there’s something for everyone in the line-up.
From a huge collection of Edvard Munch portraits, to an exploration of design and disability and a textile history of mankind, it’s going to be an exciting year in the capital for art-lovers.
Brasil! Brasil! The Birth of Modernism at Royal Academy of Arts (28 January-21 April)
This major exhibition at the Royal Academy will feature over 130 paintings from important Brazilian artists working during the 20th Century.
It will look at the diversity of Brazilian art and the contemporary trends being developed.
The majority of the artworks will come from Brazilian private collections that are very rarely seen.
Many of the other pieces from public collections have also never been shown in the UK, so it won’t be one to miss.
With works by the likes of Anita Malfatti and Lasar Segall, the exhibition will guide you through 70 years of Brazilian art, moving from figurative to abstract art.
Leigh Bowery! at Tate Modern (27 February – 31 August 2025)
To counter the February blues, why not pay a visit to the Tate to see the exhibition celebrating Leigh Bowery’s remarkable life as designer, artist, performer, club kid and musician?
It will feature some of his iconic looks and his collaborations with artists like Lucien Freud and Michael Clark.
The show will also explore the creative scenes in London and New York Bowery was involved in, featuring the likes of Boy George, RuPaul and Princess Julia.
The Tate will also be putting on a series of fun events including sound art and LGBTQ+ club culture-inspired performances.
Siena: The Rise of Painting 1300-1350 at The National Gallery (8 March – 22 June 2025)
To celebrate The National Gallery’s 200th anniversary, there will be an exhibition celebrating some of the earliest paintings in the collection. Paintings by some of the greatest Italian artists of the 14th Century are going to be reunited in Spring for the first time in centuries.
Many people know how influential Florentine artists like Botticelli and Fra Angelico were, but The National Gallery is highlighting some of the most innovative pieces in early Western painting which came out of Siena.
The exhibition will showcase a hundred pieces, varying from metalwork, gilded glass, manuscript illumination and paintings.
Make sure to watch out for the surviving panels of Duccio di Buoninsegna’s ‘Maestà’, which is the first double-sided altarpiece in Western painting.
It was made for Siena’s cathedral, and was dismantled in the 18th Century.
The National Gallery’s three panels are being reunited with the other elements from Madrid and Washington DC.
Edvard Munch Portraits at National Portrait Gallery (13 March-15 June 2025)
National Portrait Gallery will be exhibiting portraits by Edvard Munch never displayed before in the UK in spring.
It is the first UK exhibition to focus on Munch’s portraits, looking at paintings of his family, friends and his patrons.
The portraits are not only depictions of a person, but as with much of his work, demonstrations of emotion and reflections on humanity.
It will be a new perspective on Munch, as a social figure rather than a solitary one.
Don’t miss the portraits of his ‘Guardians’, as he referred to a group of his Norwegian friends, which he refused to be parted from.
Arpita Singh at Serpentine North (13 March – 27 July 2025)
Serpentine will be presenting Arpita Singh’s first solo exhibition outside of India next year to mark 25 years of the annual Pavilion commission.
You might have seen Singh’s work in the current Barbican exhibition The Imaginary Institution of India, where her colourful explorations of what it means to be a woman in India stood out.
The exhibition in Serpentine North will span her career of over 60 years and feature watercolours, ink drawings and larger scale oil paintings.
Her work spans the gap between figuration and surrealism, and it is sure to be a beautiful show.
Grayson Perry: Delusions of Grandeur at The Wallace Collection (28 March-26 October)
The Wallace Collection will be holding their largest contemporary exhibition ever in spring and it will show many pieces created and curated by Sir Grayson Perry himself, inspired by the Collection.
It will be a mixed media exhibition including ceramics, tapestries, furniture and collage, reflecting the wide range of the Marylebone gallery.
It will open on Perry’s birthday and will look at the nature of making and collecting and the gendering of decoration.
Don’t miss the works by Madge Gill and Aloïse Corbaz exploring the history of outsider art.
Textiles: The Art of Mankind at The Fashion and Textile Museum (28 March-7 September)
Over in Bermondsey, The Fashion and Textile Museum will be telling the story of humankind and the world around us through textiles.
The show will look at the importance of craft and creation to mankind and will exhibit pieces never seen before in the UK.
Among these, look out for a rare Panamanian textile of a mermaid to represent fertility.
Hiroshige: Artist of the Open Road at The British Museum (1 May-7 September)
If you’re a fan of Japanese prints, then The British Museum’s upcoming exhibition on Utagawa Hiroshige will be one not to miss.
Hiroshige was one of Japan’s most prolific and popular artists, and the exhibition will show a collection of prints depicting Japanese life in the Edo period (1603-1868).
There will be plenty of beautiful landscapes, but also some more unusual prints of cityscapes and fashionable figures of the time.
Design and Disability at V&A South Kensington (7 June-22 March 2026)
The V&A will be centring disability as a culture and an identity in June next year, and looking at design, art, architecture, fashion and photography from the 1940s onwards.
The show will be both a celebration and a call to action about disabled and neurodiverse people and communities within design and contemporary culture.
It is sure to be a fascinating insight into the political and social history of design, and showcase disability-first practices.
Abstract Erotic at The Courtauld Gallery (20 June-14 September)
It’s going to be a great year for exhibiting women artists and The Courtauld Gallery’s show Abstract Erotic is part of this.
Exhibiting works by Louise Bourgeois, Eva Hesse and Alice Adams, it will highlight these artists’ passion for using abstraction and humour within their work to explore sexuality.
There will be plenty of unconventional sculptures, with some even suspended from the ceiling.
Alice Adams, a less widely-known, American artist, will have some of her work shown for the first time in the UK.
Feature image credit to Wikimedia Commons under the license (CC BY-SA 4.0).
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