London photography exhibitions: the must sees for Autumn 2022

We zoom in on the most exciting photography exhibitions in London and around the UK 

Metz and Racine with Jacki Castelli
'Flowers / Together pt 2'
(Image credit: Metz and Racine with Jacki Castelli)

London is never short of creative goings-on, but the city's photography scene is a burgeoning source of excitement, with dedicated photography festivals, galleries and even a new photography quarter at the heart of London's Soho. Stay up-to-date with our ongoing guide to the best London photography exhibitions.


London photography exhibitions 


‘Flowers / Together pt 2’

Until 17 November

Metz and Racine with Holly Hay London photography exhibitions

'Flowers / Together pt 2'

(Image credit: Metz and Racine with Holly Hay)

A subject of constant inspiration, flowers are returned to by the photographic duo Metz and Racine for an exhibition and book, ‘Flowers / Together pt 2’. Open briefs were given to a cohort of London’s creatives (including Wallpaper*’s own photography director Holly Hay) to see flowers as an anchor point for the most dynamic inventions. Altogether the show and accompanying publication are a testament to the importance of being able to shrug off the constraints of commercial expectations in the creative process. Instead, Metz and Racine celebrate the invigorating chaos that comes from collaboration.

‘Human Stories: The Satirists’

Until13 November 2022

Leonard Suryajaya, Courtesy NOW Gallery


(Image credit: Leonard Suryajaya, Courtesy NOW Gallery)

Bringing together six rising talents across photography and film, ‘Human Stories: The Satirists’ explores the intersection of visual humour, and interconnected and diverse identities across gender, race and class. Presented by NOW Gallery, alternative worldviews are played with through flair and wit, discarding outdated dialogues. This evocative creativity is a way to ‘traverse cultural modalities of a post-pandemic world,’ curator Kaia Charles explains. The emerging artists include Bubi Canal, Leonard Suryajaya, Nyugen Smith, Thandiwe Muriu, Thy Tran and Stephen Tayo. 

Jack Davison - Photographic Etchings

Until 12 November 2022

Jack Davison, Untitled (JD-15), 2022, Photopolymer intaglio, Image size 35x29.5cm Paper Size 76x57cm © the artist, courtesy of Cob Gallery

Jack Davison, Untitled (JD), 2022, Photopolymer intaglio, Image size 35x29.5cm Paper Size 76x57cm

(Image credit: © Jack Davison, courtesy of Cob Gallery)

Now on show at Cob Gallery, Jack Davison’s ‘Photographic Etchings’ achieves a complex feat. Surreal and sensual compositions are clear and crisp at first look with their dramatic contrast, but as the etchings continue to hold the viewer's gaze they dissolve into a melted chiaroscuro, enveloping us into the second wave of surreality. Tumblr and Flickr’s formative photographic influence is present too, as the platforms on which Davison first explored the medium while photographing the Essex countryside. Combining his interest in the works of Saul Leiter, Shoji Udea, August Sander, and Man Ray, Davison Davison creates his own original strange world that blurs seeing and feeling. 

cobgallery.com

Tyler Mitchell: ‘Chrysalis’

Gagosian, Davies Street

Until 12 November

Tyler Mitchell, Cage, 2022

Tyler Mitchell, Cage, 2022

(Image credit: © Tyler Mitchell, Image courtesy of the artist, Jack Shainman Gallery, and Gagosian)

Idyllic visions of Black beauty, desire, and belonging are lensed by Tyler Mitchell in ‘Chrysalis’, his first London solo show at Gagosian, ahead of the much anticipated ‘The New Black Vanguard’ (to open at the Saatchi Gallery on October 28). Land, water and the sky are woven throughout Mitchell’s utopian visions, as he creates a universe in which the spiritual and the transformative come to the fore. Mitchell explains, ‘Collectively, these moments become figments of an imaginative psychic state of being, one in which radiance, resistance, restraint, comfort, and full human agency exist.’ 

gagosian.com

Martha Elliott is the Junior Digital News Editor at Wallpaper*. After graduating from university she worked in arts-based behavioural therapy, then embarked on a career in journalism, joining Wallpaper* at the start of 2022. She reports on art, design and architecture, as well as covering regular news stories across all channels.