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Major coup for Plymouth as National Portrait Gallery exhibition heads to The Box
18th June 2024
A major international exhibition, featuring some of the hottest names in contemporary art heads to The Box from the National Portrait Gallery this month for its only UK showing outside London. 'The Time is Always Now: Artists Reframe the Black Figure', which received five-star reviews during its London run, will be free to visit in Plymouth despite costing £16 in the capital.
It features nearly 50 works of sculpture, painting and drawing by 22 of the UK and USA’s most important living artists, including Turner Prize winner Chris Ofili and Amy Sherald, official portraitist to Michelle Obama.
The exhibition is curated by writer Ekow Eshun, formerly of The Face and Arena magazine, and will travel to the Philadelphia Museum of Art, USA after its showing in Plymouth.
The Time is Always Now is divided into three distinct sections. At The Box it starts in the beautifully restored St Luke’s church with a series of works that look at ideas of being and belonging. From fragmented portraits with large, abstract facial features to dreamlike paintings created from memory or imagination, it explores how artists see themselves as well as how they are seen and framed by others.
The exhibition continues in The Box’s main building where visitors will first encounter a striking new work by Thomas J Price. As Sounds Turn to Noise (2023) depicts a powerful larger than life female figure and comments on the under representation of Black people within art history and how they are memorialised.
The Time is Always Now then moves to two galleries on The Box’s first floor. The first contains a series of works connected by the themes of assembly and gathering. Here, huge paintings show domestic and public spaces – capturing experiences of life in homes, gardens, barbershops and nightclubs. They include works by 1998 Turner Prize winner Chris Ofili, 2017 Turner Prize nominee Hurvin Anderson and Grenada-born Denzil Forrester, who now lives and works in Cornwall.
The Time is Always Now will launch with a special in conversation event with curator Ekow Eshun from 11am-12pm on Saturday 29 June. Tickets (£10 standard / £8 members) are available now.
The exhibition will also inspire a series of family-friendly arts and crafts workshops on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays throughout the summer holidays. The free drop-in sessions begin on Tuesday 23 July and run until Thursday 29 August. A Bitesize talk offering a deeper insight into some of the works on display will take place on Wednesday 24 July from 1pm-1.45pm.
The Time is Always Now: Artists Reframe the Black Figure runs from 29 June - 29 September 2024. The exhibition is open from 10am-5pm Tuesday to Sunday and Bank Holiday Monday (26 August 2024). Admission is free and there’s no need to book.