PAST CREATE! EVENTS
Current Exhibitions & Displays
Explore the V&A's programme of changing exhibitions and displays. Complementing the Museum's permanent collection, they cover a broad range of subjects from design and fashion to photography and architecture.
Major exhibitions feature multiple rooms of objects and installations while smaller displays are sometimes located in just a single case.
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Decode: Digital Design Sensations
Opto-Isolator, 2007, Golan Levin with Greg Balthus, Photo: John Berens, courtesy bitforms gallery nyc
8 December 2009 - 11 April 2010
In partnership with SAP
The Porter Gallery
£5 Adults
£4 Concessions
Free to V&A Members. For information on how to become a member visit our Membership pages.Digitally growing plants and a mechanical eye that mirrors the blink of a visitor's gaze are among the digital works that feature in Decode: Digital Design Sensations. The exhibition shows the latest developments in digital and interactive design, from small screen based graphics to large-scale installations. Curated in collaboration with leading digital arts organisation onedotzero, there are works by established international artists and designers including Daniel Brown, Golan Levin and Daniel Rozin as well as emerging designers such as Troika and Simon Heijdens.
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The Half by Simon Annand
Daniel Craig Photo Simon Annand
25 January – 11 April 2010
Theatre and Performance, Room 104
Free admissionThis display showcases the work of Simon Annand, photographer of leading actors in the West End for the last 20 years. It provides a rare glimpse into the dressing rooms of actors in the precious, private few moments before the show: The Half. This half an hour before curtain up is used for focus and concentration and is strictly private. All members of the public are required to leave. Whatever has gone on during the day, the actor must use this time to make a transition into the fictional character of the play. There is no escape. These photographs pay tribute to the dedication of stage actors and reveal not only technical skills but also aspects of a very personal nightly ritual.
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Horace Walpole and Strawberry Hill
The Walpole Cabinet, designed by Horace Walpole and William Kent, cabinet attributed to William Hallett, figures by J.F. Verskovis and medallions by Andrea Pozzo, 1743. Museum no. W.52-1925
6 March - 4 July 2010
£6 Adults
£5 Concessions (seniors, students, 12–17-year olds, ES40 holders)
Free to V&A Members
For information on how to become a member visit our Membership pages .This is the first major exhibition on Horace Walpole, the most important English collector of the 18th century, and brings together many of his most remarkable objects. Walpole was the first to systematically assemble the visual evidence of English history, and the first to recognise the importance of the portrait miniature to the history of British art.
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David Watkins - Artist in Jewellery, a Retrospective View (1972 - 2010)
'Torus 300: Blue Burst', neckpiece, David Watkins, 2006.
23 February - 26 September 2010
Silver galleries, room 68
Free admission
Celebrate the career of David Watkins, leading British artist jeweller and sculptor in metal. This retrospective features 68 pieces of jewellery that show how his early jewellery as miniature sculptures developed to become large scale wearable objects that also exist independently as art objects. The use of different techniques, materials and styles displayed across these pieces shows his versatility as an artist jeweller and heralds Watkins as a contemporary force in international design.
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'We are all mad here': Alice in popular culture
Sir John Tenniel, 'Alice in Wonderland'. Museum no. E. 2843 - 1901.
5 March - 12 June 2010
NAL Landing, Room 85
Free admission
Explore ways in which Lewis Carroll's fictional world of Alice has pervaded our popular culture, art, literature, music and religion in this display of modern illustrated editions, graphic novels, comics and ephemera.
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Digital Pioneers
Herbert W. Franke, Squares (Quadrate), screenprint, 1969/70. Given by the Computer Arts Society, supported by System Simulation Ltd, London. Museum no. E.113-2008
7 December 2009 – 25 April 2010
Julie & Robert Breckman Prints and Drawings Gallery, Room 90 and Paintings, Room 88a
Free admissionThis display provides an overview of the first decades of the computer's history in art and design. It includes some of the earliest computer-generated works in the V&A's collections, many of which have never been exhibited in the UK before. Digital Pioneers offers a historical context for contemporary digital practice, and is scheduled to coincide with the V&A exhibition Decode: Digital Design Sensations.
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A Fairyland of Flowers: Beatrix Potter and Cicely Mary Barker
Cicely Mary Barker (1895–1973) Illustration of the Pink Fairies for Flower Fairies of the Garden 1944. Reproduction of Flower Fairy illustrations, © The Estate of Cicely Mary Barker, 2009
21 December 2009 – 14 June 2010
Leighton, Room 102
Free admissionThis small display features illustrations by Cicely Mary Barker. In her fascination with natural history and scientific observation, Barker has often been associated with Beatrix Potter. Both were strongly influenced by what Potter described as the Pre-Raphaelites' 'niggling but absolutely genuine admiration for copying natural details'. Their principal concern was to explore the world of the imagination while remaining faithful to the true likeness of things. Sketching always from life, Barker and Potter show a keen eye for natural beauty and a botanist's concern for scientific accuracy.
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Gargoyles and Shadows: Gothic Architecture and 19th-Century Photography
Photograph, Westminster, with The Henry VII Chapel and Clock Tower of The Houses of Parliament, Stephen Ayling, U.K., about 1869
7 January – 16 May 2010
Architecture, Room 128a
Free admissionDrawing on the V&A's rich holdings of 19th-century photographs, this display examines the relationship that developed between photography and architectural practice in the 19th century and explores how photography facilitated the re-discovery of an idealised past. The display also addresses the role played by photography in the recording of buildings before demolition and its use as a tool for preserving the national architectural heritage.
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Capturing the Imagination: British Fairy-tale Illustrations 1860-1940
Charles Robinson, Goblins cross-examining a baby whom one of them has captured (detail). Museum no. E.172-1982
18 December 2009 - 12 June 2010
Leighton, Room 102
Free admissionThis display features watercolours by artists of the Golden Age of illustration, including Arthur Rackham and Edmund Dulac. It explores their imaginative responses to folk tales and fairyland.
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An 18th-Century Enigma: Paul de Lamerie and the Maynard Master
The Maynard Dish, London, England 1736-37, Paul de Lamerie. LOAN: The Cahn family foundation.
11 May 2009 - 9 May 2010
Silver, Room 66
Free admissionThis display reveals the brilliant craftsmanship of Paul de Lamerie (1688-1751), the greatest silversmith working in England in the 18th century, and his craftsman, known as the Maynard Master. The V&A's outstanding collection of silver is showcased alongside masterpieces from the collection of Sir Arthur Gilbert, including a lavishly decorated salver, a lion mask (one of the signature elements of the Maynard Master), and the Maynard Dish, the piece that marked the first appearance of the artistic personality responsible for de Lamerie's most ambitious commissions.
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V&A Illustration Awards 2009
'New York Trilogy', Tom Burns, 2008
9 June 2009 - 21 March 2010
Sponsored by the Enid Linder Foundation
20th Century, Room 74
Free admissionThe V&A Illustration Awards are held annually to highlight the best book and editorial illustration by UK artists published in the previous year. Their aim is to encourage, recognise and celebrate high standards of creativity in the industry. Prizes are also given to the most promising student illustrators. In 2009, Tom Burns won the prize for Best Illustrated Book for the Folio Society edition of Paul Auster's The New York Trilogy. He was also voted the overall winner of the competition. This display showcases many of the competition winners and entries.
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Judaica from the Gilbert Collection
Torah crown, Austria, about 1825. Museum no. Loan:Gilbert 68:1-2008
Until 30 September 2010
Sacred Silver, Room 83
Free AdmissionThis small display features ornate Jewish ritual objects from Rosalinde and Arthur Gilbert's collection. Arthur Gilbert's family, the Bernsteins, were successful Jewish immigrants, who had moved to London from Poland in the 1890s. Central to Jewish observance is the Torah, the first five books of the Hebrew Bible. The scroll on which the Torah is written is wound on rollers called 'Trees of Life' ('Atzei Hayyim'). It is customary to decorate the rollers with either a crown or a pair of rimmonim. The crown symbolises majesty and the law of Torah. The rimmonim evoke the bells worn on the high priest's robe as described in the Book of Exodus.
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Objects of Luxury: French porcelain of the eighteenth century
Sugar basin and cover, Saint-Cloud, about 1700-20, Museum no. 487-1909
18 September 2009 - end May 2010
Room 146
Free admissionCelebrate one of the most exciting discoveries of the 18th century in this display.
Known as 'white gold', porcelain was produced for use in all aspects of fashionable public and private life; from banquets to boudoirs, from tea drinking to the toilette. The sensuous charm of the 'soft-paste' porcelain produced in France earned it universal admiration. This display introduces the major French factories, including the Royal Porcelain Manufacture at Sèvres, and demonstrates the wide variety of objects they could provide for their fashionable clientele.
