London’s art scene is bursting with possibilities this April. Journey to a 1980s New York subway as Keith Haring’s drawings are recreated at Moco Museum, discover Rachel Whiteread’s large-scale, mixed-media pieces at Gagosian, delve into the world of surrealist couturier Elsa Schiaparelli at the V&A, or ponder the links between scent and social control with Racheal Crowther at Chisenhale Gallery. From group shows to career retrospectives, plan your next visit with our frequently updated guide to the month’s best offerings.
Heading across the pond? Here are the best New York art exhibitions to see this month.
London art exhibitions: what to see in April 2026
Voice of the Street – Keith Haring’s Subway Drawings
MOCO Museum London until 18 June 2026
Moco Museum is transforming into a New York 1980s subway, with a focus on Keith Haring’s chalk drawings. 30 of his works, which he drew between 1980 and 1985, are recreated in a subway environment. These works were immediate, yet often erased within hours – his fast paced drawing was meant to be enjoyed by everyone, as the artist once said; ‘Art is for everybody.’
Donald Locke: Resistant Forms
Camden Art Centre 10 April until 30 August 2026
Camden Art Centre deep dives into the work of the late Guyanese-British artist Donald Locke. This exhibition is designed to showcase his significant contributions as a post-war artist of the Windrush Generation and 20th century British sculpture, which has been significantly overlooked. Expect to see his early biomorphic ceramics, large scale paintings, and mixed media.
Rachel Whiteread: Substitute
Gagosian until 16 May 2026
Rachel Whiteread, Untitled (Stable Door), 2024–26, papier-mâché and silver leaf, in aluminum frame© Rachel Whiteread. Photo: Prudence Cuming Associates Ltd
Following her exhibition ‘On Paper’ at Hazlitt Holland-Hibbert, Rachel Whiteread presents new works at Gagosian. The exhibition features wall-mounted sculptural reliefs, made with papier-mâché pigmented silver and copper leaf. The exhibition title comes from the artist using one medium to echo the other.
Nick Goss Eel Pie Island Hotel
Josh Lilley from 23 April until 27 May 2026
Discover paintings inspired by Eel Pie Island Hotel on the Thames at Twickenham. Once part squat, part commune, and part dancehall, the hotel was destroyed by fire in the 1970s. Drawing on oral histories and archival material, Goss treats history as unstable. In his paintings, the building appears only in fragments, glimpsed through foliage, crowds or emptied interiors. It transcends specific time periods, and adds an elusive mystery to this destination.
Schiaparelli: Fashion Becomes Art
V&A from 28 March 2026
Designer Elsa Schiaparelli wearing black silk dress with crocheted collar of her own design and a turban, photograph by Fredrich Baker, Vogue, 1940
The V&A welcomes the UK’s first exhibition on fashion designer Elsa Schiaparelli, spanning her work from the 1920s, to the fashion house’s evolution today, under the creative director Daniel Roseberry. His contemporary designs have created conversation in recent years; including a dress with faux-taxidermy lion heads, to a delicate lung dress boasting a string of golden veins.
The Music is Black: A British Story
V&A East Museum from 18 April 2026
Also at the V&A is ‘The Music is Black: A British Story’, an exhibition charting 125 years of Black music-making in the UK. It is a deep dive into how this music shaped British culture.
Veronica Ryan: Multiple Conversations
Whitechapel Gallery 1 April until 14 June 2026
The exhibition showcases over 100 works across four decades from the Freelands Award and Turner Prize winning artist, Veronica Ryan. It highlights her expansive practice spanning sculpture, textiles, and works on paper. ‘Multiple Conversations’ also presents recently rediscovered works from the 1980s, which shows the artist's deep interest in psychology, and memory.
Racheal Crowther
Chisenhale Gallery from 17 April until 14 June 2026
London-based artist Racheal Crowther’s exhibition with Chisenhale Gallery explores governance, surveillance, and institutional power, and how this is entangled with systems of care. Crowther investigates scent, which has been used as a tool of influence and social control, and traces the many roles of sensory manipulation across time.
'The Weight of Being'
Two Temple Place, London until 19 April 2026
From mental health to masculinity and belonging, ‘The Weight of Being’ at Two Temple Place traces the emotional textures of everyday life, balancing heaviness and joy. Set against a grandiose backdrop of Neo-Tudor architecture, the show presents a medley of sculpture, photography, film and painting. Shedding light on vulnerability, the struggles of mental health, and acts of resilience.
Writer: Teshome Douglas-Campbell
The Coming of Age
Wellcome Collection from 25 March 2026
At the Wellcome Collection, ‘Coming of Age’ explores the perceptions of aging from adolescence to adulthood. Specifically it looks at how societies can adapt for us all to age better. The exhibition is rooted in the statistic that people are living longer. In the UK one in ten children are expected to live beyond the age of 100. The question the exhibition asks is ‘Who gets to live longer and “age well”?’ Bringing together different perspectives from art, science and popular culture, ‘Coming of Age’ explores the assumptions made about life stages and asks what greater longevity means for all of us.
Iria Leino: Open Secret
The Arts Club until 26 April 2026
The Arts Club presents a retrospective of Iria Leino (1932–2022). The Finnish-born, New York-based painter was known for her abstract paintings which captured post-war America. It is a great look into the lesser-known artist ( due to her more reclusive, non-commercial practice), and introduces people to her rediscovered body of work.
David Hockney: A Year in Normandie and Some Other Thoughts about Painting
Serpentine North until 23 August 2026
In his latest exhibition, and his first at Serpentine, David Hockney presents an exhibition inviting people to slow down and enjoy the beauty within the mundane. New works were created specifically for the showcase, rooted in his belief that beauty is worth celebrating.
Rachel Whiteread: On Paper
Hazlitt Holland-Hibbert until 18 April 2026
For artist Rachel Whiteread, she has long stated that she keeps her sculptures and drawings separate, with many works having labels on the back stating: ‘It is Rachel Whiteread’s express wish that none of her drawings should be exhibited alongside her sculptures’. Here, we see the works in tangent. The exhibition, which was created in close partnership with the artists, presents a moment in her own understanding of how she wants her works to be viewed. The exhibition full of drawings dated from the 1990s which have never been shown, coupled with her sculptural work, highlights its fluid relationship of texture from glossy, and grainy, to direct and bold.
Catherine Opie: To Be Seen
National Portrait Gallery until 31 May 2026
American artist Catherine Opie presents her photographic portraits in her first major museum exhibition in the UK. Opie’s work explores queer communities, children, surfers, high school footballers, political crowds, and self-portraiture. Making these groups visible, her work ranges from 30 years, including her 1991 collection Being and Having, which are her portraits of LGBTQ+ friends inspired by court painter Hans Holbein. Collectively she highlights subjects who are seen and unseen in art.
Cecily Brown: Picture Making
Serpentine South Gallery from 27 March until 6 September 2026
Inspired by Kensington Gardens, painter Cecily Brown presents her green compositions which dance with bold brushwork, and colour, resulting in dynamic movement within her pieces. Nature and park life are at the forefront of Brown’s work. Here you will see her exploring this theme through scale and colour, along with a sprinkling of romance from couples, woodland scenes and nature walks. It is a hopeful exhibition, which highlights the beauty within the English landscape, the nostalgia of children’s book illustrations, and has a hint of warning through cautionary tales, all of which are gestures to Brown’s own memories.
Shifting Boundaries
Hauser & Wirth until 30 April 2026
Ōsaka-born artist Takesada Matsutani will showcase his first exhibition in London in over a decade. The exhibition deep dives into his signature style: working with vinyl glue and graphite. It ranges from his previous sculptural pieces to new works that show his experimentation with the unusual medium.
Lynda Benglis and Giacometti: Back at ya
Barbican until 31 May 2026
Barbican presents ‘Back at ya’ by Lynda Benglis and Giacometti. Benglis is known for her vibrant forms she creates which balance playful energy with visceral abstract touches. Here, she will present almost 30 unseen works (which have until now hung on the walls of her studio in Santa Fe, New Mexico). Made from handmade paper stretched over chicken wire and embellished with “cast sparkle”, they will be shown alongside iconic pieces by Giacometti.
Echo by Klára Hosnedlová
White Cube until 29 March 2026
Klára Hosnedlová’s solo exhibition Echo marks her debut with the gallery. Her distinctive multidisciplinary style spans from spanning sculpture, performance, architecture, and intricate embroidery. She is known for creating immersive installations that draw on historical narratives, and Central-Eastern European architectural forms, evoking futuristic archaeological worlds.
Tracey Emin: A Second Life
Tate Modern until 31 August
A much-anticipated landmark exhibition will open this month, tracing 40 years of Tracey Emin’s work, including painting, video, textiles, neons, writing, sculpture, and installation – and spanning unseen pieces as well as some of her most renowned works, such as the radical My Bed from 1998. The exhibition will explore her raw confessional work, which sparked widespread debate when she rose to prominence in the 1990s. Here, she explores themes of love, trauma, passion, pain and healing.
Conceptual Art and Christine Kozlov
Raven Row until 26 April 2026
At Raven Row, the work of Christine Kozlov (1945-2005) is examined in terms of her part in art’s radical new direction that would became known as Conceptual Art. The exhibition traces the American artist’s practice, first in New York, then through her move to the UK (in 1977) and her responses to global political events. Focusing on her objects, ideas and collaborative practices, the exhibition unveils the scope of Kozlov’s artistic activity from the mid-1960s to the late 1970s.
Aki Sasamoto: Grilled Diagrams
Studio Voltaire until 19 April 2026
Studio Voltaire presents ‘Grilled Diagrams’, Japanese artist Aki Sasamoto’s first solo show in the UK. Here, visitors will find a major site-specific installation which acts as both a sculptural environment and performance set. In the middle of the installation is a large, oversized griddle inspired by television cooking shows and street food carts. In the opening and closing weeks of the exhibition, Sassamoto inserts herself into the installation, whereby her performances unfold as live acts of drawing or choreography focusing on the manipulation of ingredients.
Lucian Freud: Drawing into Painting
The National Portrait Gallery until 4 May 2026
Drawing into Painting marks the UK’s first museum exhibition dedicated to Lucian Freud’s works on paper, and his lifelong exploration of the human face and form. The National Portrait Gallery presents his works in pencil, ink, charcoal and etching.
Rose Wylie: The Picture Comes First
Royal Academy until 19 April 2026
With her work nodding to fIlms and with echoes of the Second World War, Rose Wylie’s paintings are alive with references to cinema, celebrities, literature, and ancient civilisation. Focusing mostly on iconic women, think Nicole Kidman, Marilyn Monroe, Serena Williams, and Snow White, she creates paintings that intertwine with her own lived experiences such as living through the Blitz as a young girl. Wylie found success in her career as a painter, which she started later in life in her fifties.
Beatriz González
Barbican until 10 May 2026
Colombian artist Beatriz González (who recently passed away earlier this year) is known for her bold work which explores the power and impact of the images we encounter everyday.
The exhibition , which features over 150 of her works, varies from large scale paintings to repurposed furniture, wallpaper and installations. The images that inspire her questions power structures to looking at violence, and offering her personal reflection on grief and community.
Luigi Ghirri: Felicità
Thomas Dane Gallery until 9 May 2026
‘Luigi Ghirri: Felicità’ at Thomas Dane Gallery proposes happiness not as a condition to be attained, but as a way of inhabiting the world through images. Curated by Alessio Bolzoni and Luca Guadagnino, and unfolding across both of Thomas Dane’s Duke Street spaces, the exhibition makes a persuasive case for Ghirri as one of the most lucid thinkers of photography’s perceptual limits – and one of its most generous practitioners.
Writer: Finn Blythe
Wes Anderson: The Archives
Design Museum until 26 July 2026
The pastel-tinted world of Wes Anderson is celebrated in a retrospective coming to London’s Design Museum. This is the first exhibition dedicated to the director that looks at the evolution of his films. It will showcase over 600 models, props and costumes from Anderson’s films, from his first experiments in the 1990s right up to his most recent Oscar-winning The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar. Accompanying this, the exhibition will also feature his first drafts and work-in-progress material, including small-scale models such as the 3m wide model of The Grand Budapest Hotel.
Blitz: the club that shaped the 80s
Design Museum until 29 March 2026
Spandau Ballet’s debut photo shoot at the Warren Street squat, 1980
The Blitz club, which launched the careers of acts such as Spandau Ballet, Visage, and Boy George, transformed London style in the 1980s. The Design Museum welcomes visitors to explore the club’s history and atmosphere through music, fashion, film and graphic design.
The David Bowie Centre
V&A East Storehouse, permanent
Fashion, memorabilia and personal ephemera from David Bowie, now on view at the V&A East Storehouse in London, are as wondrous in their range as their creator. The pioneering musician's 90,000-item personal archive are equally accessible, and – like the artist at the heart of it – equally wondrous in their range. Bowie was an inveterate curator – you might say hoarder – of his own life, keeping every quicksilver fashion statement, every scrap of paper, every piece of memorabilia, amassing a deeply personal life-map that accompanies the Centre’s 70,000 photographs, negatives and colour transparencies. So, alongside the rejection letters are fan correspondence that he kept with equal assiduousness.
Writer Craig McLean
Read the full review of The David Bowie Centre
Nigerian Modernism
Tate Modern until 10 May 2026
‘Nigerian Modernism’ explores modern art in Nigeria in the mid-20th century and the artists who pioneered the movement. Visitors journey through a story of artistic works which spanned across Zaria, Ibadan, Lagos and Enugu, as well as London, Munich and Paris. The exhibition looks at multidimensional works which unites Nigerian, African and European techniques by artists working before and after the decade of national independence from British colonial rule in 1960.
1880 THAT: Christine Sun Kim and Thomas Mader
Wellcome Collection until 6 April 2026
At the Wellcome Collection creative duo Christine Sun Kim and Thomas Mader have collaborated on their latest exhibition ‘1880 THAT’ which includes film, installation and drawings to explore the communication between signed and spoken languages, and challenge a medical perspective of deafness as something to be cured. The brick motif is a recurring theme in the exhibition symbolising the building blocks of language, as well as the act of throwing bricks as a gesture of protest. The exhibition is a mix of witty design, humour and word play to uncover the complexities of meaning and (mis)understanding.