“Søgelys” by Eva Helene Pade
Where: Thaddaeus Ropac
When: October 14–December 20
Why It’s Worth a Look: Crowds—whether at a protest or on the dance floor—should never be underestimated. Danish-born artist Eva Helene Pade explores the ecstatic, intuitive psychology of the crowd with her burnished, monumental paintings in this new show.
Know Before You Go: Pade is interested in what happens when repressed instincts bubble up to the surface. Even if the action on the canvas is hidden, the artist’s work suggests that nothing stays repressed for long. The title of the show is probing unto itself, as søgelys is the Danish word for “searchlight.”
“One Big Animal” by Dana Schutz
Where: Thomas Dane
When: October 14–December 20
Why It’s Worth a Look: Following the major survey at the Musée d’Art Moderne de Paris that closed in February 2024 and the Parisian solo show at David Zwirner that came after it, Dana Schutz is debuting a selection of new paintings and bronze sculptures in her playfully grotesque style, dropping subjects into absurd, emotional situations ranging from anxious, to hopeless, to delightfully comedic.
Know Before You Go: Note Schutz’s mastery of the character and group study. In her piece The Rally, she depicts a crowd plowing forth, leaving scattered trash and buildings falling like dominoes in its wake. In Daily Wear, a lone figure holds the eerily-shed skin of a chameleonic companion.
“Reproductions” by Ghislaine Leung
Where: Cabinet Gallery
When: Through December 13
Why It’s Worth a Look: Ghislaine Leung’s highly conceptual and visually spare output deals with the labor conditions of making art. Consider this—what other exhibition this season will have the show’s itemized budget displayed on the wall? Leung’s transparency reveals the administrative, logistical, and physical labor behind the production of a body of work.
Know Before You Go: Unlike shows which typically begin with pre-install white wash, Leung embraces the residue of past exhibitions. Her work is presented alongside holes and cracks in the unpainted walls, tape, previous exhibition captions, and scuffs left on the floor, gesturing to the labor of appearances within a gallery space.
“GLAS NEGUS SUPREME” by Arthur Jafa
Where: Sadie Coles
When: Through December 20
Why It’s Worth a Look: Venice Biennale Golden Lion winner Arthur Jafa—whose work fuses filmmaking, visual art, and music to interrogate the Black cultural imagination—returns with two new moving image works. Long interested in the primordial impulses of popular music, Jafa’s newest pieces use the figures of Kurt Cobain and Foxy as jumping off points.
Know Before You Go: This show comes at a particularly buzzy time for the artist, following a recent collaboration with critical theorist Saidiya Hartman at Internationaal Theater Amsterdam, and later this year, a show at the Museum of Modern Art, which Jafa will curate.
“Postures: Jean Rhys in the Modern World”
Where: Michael Werner
When: Through November 22
Why It’s Worth a Look: Curated by Pulitzer Prize-winning writer and critic Hilton Als, this group exhibition focuses on the enduring legacy of Dominican-born British writer Jean Rhys, whose droll and expansive novels left a lasting impact on post-colonial Caribbean literature. The exhibition traces her life and the various geographies that informed it through a selection of work by artists including Somaya Critchlow, Kara Walker, and Florian Krewer. It’s a group adept at fiery, rich visualization and emotional portraiture alike.
Know Before You Go: This is the latest in a series of exhibitions curated by Als that spotlight influential literary figures. Previous installments include “Joan Didion: What She Means” at the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles in 2022 and “The Morning, This Evening, So Soon: James Baldwin and the Voices of Queer Resistance” at the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, DC in 2024.
“Wolfgang Tillmans: Build from Here”
Where: Maureen Paley
When: Through December 20
Why It’s Worth a Look: The first to show in Maureen Paley’s new Herald Street gallery space, Wolfgang Tillmans debuts a new series of photos and video works focused on the machinery of urban landscapes. By overlaying tactile, analog objects (Ghanaian seashells, vintage post stamps, rusted metal) with his images, Tillmans highlights the camera’s ability to render objects as abstractions.
Know Before You Go: Pay close attention the walls, nooks, and crannies of the space, as they once collectively housed Tillmans’s former London studio before he moved his production to Berlin in 2011.
“Big Love Baby” by Danny Fox
Where: Hannah Barry
When: Through November 15
Why It’s Worth a Look: Danny Fox’s intimate portraits of bodies at rest, play, and work invite the viewer into a world of daydreams. With tempered autumnal colors, Fox captures figures pulled from life amidst the many wayposts between intimacy, connection, and alienation.
Know Before You Go: The film Another Another World, narrated by Fox, will play at the gallery in a London premiere on Oct. 29, aligned with the show’s run and directed by Jackson Whitefield.
“HUSH MR GIANT” by Hannah Black
Where: Arcadia Missa
When: Through November 1
Why It’s Worth a Look: In an era when human rights are increasingly in jeopardy across the globe, Hannah Black explores the United Nations’s post-WWII adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which established a baseline of freedoms and equalities for people of all nations. She visualizes meditations on the document and its text with spiraling oil paintings, which invert and invigorate its language into ecstatic poetry.
Know Before You Go: Each painting, inspired by Duchamp’s surrealist film Anemic Cinema, is penetrated with nails and thread depicting the astrological configurations of the planet during historic revolutions. In this way, Black draws a historic lineage up to the present day in the ongoing struggle for human equality worldwide.
“Christopher Wool”
Where: Gagosian
When: Through December 19
Why It’s Worth a Look: While post-conceptual artist Christopher Wool is widely known for his defiantly stenciled and spray-painted work, his latest show at Gagosian highlights the range of artistic methods he employs on the canvas, from silkscreens to turpentine-soaked rags dragged across the surface of the works.
Know Before You Go: On the heels of his self-orchestrated solo show in New York last year, mounted not in a gallery, but in a raw office space in the Financial District, Wool is returning to Gagosian with his biggest show since 2004, exhibiting over 50 works in total.
“Tendered” by Karimah Ashadu
Where: Camden Art Centre
When: Through March 22, 2026
Why It’s Worth a Look: In MUSCLE, 2025, Nigerian bodybuilders’ pectorals ripple as they grip concrete dumbbells in the heart of Lagos’s slums. Karimah Ashadu’s newest video installation probes the hyper-masculine ideals of this subculture and the promise of economic independence.
Know Before You Go: Growing up between Nigeria and the U.K., Ashadu uses her camera lens to explore masculinity and labor in a diasporic context, from motorcycle taxi drivers to tin miners to slaughterhouse workers in West Africa and beyond.
“Peter Doig: House of Music”
Where: Serpentine
When: Through February 8, 2026
Why It’s Worth a Look: In his latest exhibition for Serpentine and alongside his paintings, Peter Doig is creating a special playlist curated from his personal collection of vinyl and cassettes. The show emphasizes the overlap between his practice as a painter and the music that inspires it, including Trinidadian disco, calypso, and bele.
Know Before You Go: Every Sunday, a cohort of collaborators will activate the space with their own DJ mixes and listening sessions. Participants include Brian Eno, Arthur Jafa, Cafe OTO, Sean O’Hagan, Ed Ruscha, and Dennis Bovell.
“Kerry James Marshall: The Histories”
Where: Royal Academy
When: Through January 18, 2026
Why It’s Worth a Look: In a moment when shows that emphasize Black figures and identity have been under attack in the U.S., the display of Kerry James Marshall’s vignettes of Black life from the Middle Passage, to dance halls, to the barber shop transforms from a celebration of life to act of resistance across the pond.
Know Before You Go: This exhibition is the artist’s largest solo show held in the U.K. and Europe to date. In Marshall’s sumptuous worlds, history is happening all at once, and at the Royal Academy, this intention is on hearty display.
“Gilbert and George: 21st Century Pictures”
Where: Hayward Gallery
When: Through January 11, 2026
Why It’s Worth a Look: Gilbert and George have always taken a cheeky approach to their favorite subjects: gigolos, drugs, religion, and cash. Their latest show at the Southbank Centre, which focuses on their photography from the last 25 years, is a kaleidoscopic shower of stained glass, classified ads, Satanic visions, and debauchery, all rendered with their signature Terry Gilliam-esque whimsy.
Know Before You Go: The octogenarian duo, with their signature suits and genteel appearances, have been quipping their way through life for over 50 years as creative and romantic partners, with this show offering a renewing chance to reflect on their oeuvre.
“É preciso não ter medo de criar” by Sonia Gomes
Where: Pace
When: October 14–November 15
Why It’s Worth a Look: At 77, Brazilian artist Sonia Gomes and her knotty, textural sculptures are coming to Pace. Her show at the gallery, which includes signature pendants and torsions as well as paintings and sculptures, is happening concurrently with her first solo exhibition in the United States at Storm King this season. The show, which borrows its name from Clarice Lispector’s 1943 book Near to the Wild Heart, presents new works, including her first-ever bronze casts of textile-wrapped burls and tree branches.
Know Before You Go: Gomes puts textile and medium front and center. Her bulbous and tactile creations incorporate everything from reclaimed driftwood, birdcages, and wire to 19th-century vestments, hand-stitched cotton from the Chinese-Tibetan border, and gold leaf.
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