2022 Exhibitions
#nationalism [aesthetics]: (Be)Longing, Rediscovering, Rebuilding Identities /7-19 March. Curated by and featuring the works by third-year BA students from the Department of War Studies. More
'Global But Local': Student Global Affairs Photography Competition/ 14- 25 March. A selection of stunning photos by students from the Global Institutes, and the departments of International Development and Global Health & Social Medicine. More
Thinking Inside the Box/ 30 March- 29 April. A co-curricular project between the Brazil Institute, Department of War Studies and Department of History. Working in close partnership with University of London’s Senate House Library, the project takes a deep dive into their largely unknown yet expansive collection of Latin American political posters and pamphlets of the mid-20th century. The exhibit will be accompanied by original written works from both undergraduate and postgraduate students that engage critically with the visual, communicative, historical and political relevance of the materials. More
Dignity & Resistance: Fighting gender-based Violence/ 3-13 May. Exhibition Launch and talk: 4th May, from 6pm-8pm. RSVP here. This exhibition draws on the recent body of collaborative research led by Professor Cathy McIlwaine (Department of Geography, King’s College London) with a number of international and local partners, gathering evidence around the pathways that women living in peripheral communities in Brazil, and Brazilian migrants in London develop - consciously and unconsciously - to resist direct and indirect gender-based violence. More
War Beyond Battle, 25 May -10 June 2022. Celebrating the last decade of the Department of War Studies collaboration with artists, War Beyond Battle brings together works from four major exhibitions spearheaded by the Department: Going South (2015), Traces of War (2016), Reconciliations (2018), and Truth Tellers (2019). More deatils about this exhibitions are on the War Beyond Battle (kcl.ac.uk) page.
Refugee Week: A celebration of refugee artists. 13 -23 June. An exhibition curated by the Africa Leadership Centre examining minority life narratives in democratic societies. More information is at Refugee Week: A celebration of refugee artists (kcl.ac.uk)
Decolonising Global Health Photography Exhibition. 20-30 September. Celebrating the 10th Anniversary of the School of Global Health & Social Medicine
Previous Exhibitions
Reconciliations, 1 November-1 December 2018. A large-scale public exhibition and events programme including installations, dance performances, screenings and talks at the Exchange. It was part of a major AHRC-funded project, ‘Art & Reconciliation: Conflict, Culture and Community’, led by academics from the Department of War Studies in collaboration with the University of the Arts London and the London School of Economics. See the full event series here, read related news about the exhibition, the dance performance and article: Contact Improvisation as an Embodied Approach to Reconciliation. View Reconciliations album.
Home Is... March-April 2019. A collection of work and performances produced by the public, students and researchers from King's Migration Research Group and UK in a Changing Europe who were invited to explore the theme of home through poetry, writing and illustration workshops with poet Tolu Agbelusi. The exhibition extended to include Museum without a Home, supported by the Kings Student Action for Refugees (STAR) Society and Oxfam. View Home Is album
Truth Tellers: Traumatic truth-making as art and politics. April- May, 2019. An exhibition of art, poetry and narrative created from a collaboration between painter Tom de Freston, poet Mariah Whelan and international relations scholars Drs. Christiana Spens (St Andrews) and Pablo de Orellana (KCL). Watch artist interview .
Exclusions. 1 October-7 November, 2019. Works created by researcher-artist collaborations with Dr Pablo de Orellana, Mariah Whelan (poet) Dr Henry Redwood, Vladimir Miladinovic (artist), Dr Negar Elodie Behzadi, Kate Jessop (animation artist) Prof. Cathy McIlwaine, Gael le Cornec (actor.) View album here Hosted by VEM+. Watch video. View Album. A number of workshops for young people exploring exclusion were funded by the ESRC Festival of Social Sciences. View Exclusions album.
Things That Art. November 2019. A selection of drawings from Things that Art (University of Toronto Press, 2019) by Lochlann Jain, Professor of Social Medicine, (KCL) Things that Art reconsiders and interrupts the ways in which categories underpin knowledge systems and also aims to realise drawing as a useful and provocative method in the social sciences. Interview with Lochlann. Read the news item: Drawing to explore how meaning is made (kcl.ac.uk)
Art, Conflict & Remembering: The Murals of the Bogside Artists. Jan-February 2020 This travelling exhibition tells the story of the Troubles through the twelve large-scale murals of The People’s Gallery in Derry/Londonderry, Northern Ireland. It is curated by Dr. Adrienne Dengerink Chaplin, Visiting Research Fellow in Department of Theology and Religious Studies at King's. It includes an events programme in collaboration with the Centre for the Study of Divided Societies, Department of War Studies, and the Department of Theology and Religious Studies at King's. View Bogside album
Student Exhibitions
Hybridity and Identity: Images from the Ecuadorian Andes, October 2018. A selection of photos by PhD researcher, Andrea Espinoza, from the Department of International Development, this exhibition aimed to explore about ideas of hybridity, mixture, mimic, adaptation, authenticity and diversity in the life of people in Llin Llin Pucará, an indigenous community in the Ecuadorian Andes. Read the news article and watch interviews with the researchers.
Student Showcases. We support student-curated exhibitions of photography, illustration, poetry, music and installations, which gives us an opportunity to celebrate our students in the Faculty of Social Science & Public Policy. The fusion of diverse backgrounds, experiences, cultures and traditions in the collections offer a glimpse into the ever changing world we are currently living in. View the albums 2018 Collection and 2019 Collection
Virtual Exhibition/ Growing Up During Neighbourhood Change in South London. March 2020. PhD Candidate Hanna Riazuddin, from the Department of Geography led this project by young people as peer researchers to reflect on questions of psychosocial health within the wider debate on urban regeneration, gentrification and social transformation. This photovoice exhbit moved online after March lockdown and is due to be exhibited in The Exchange in mid 2021.
View the complete list of past exhibitions
Projects
Re-imagining Our Environment: Think, Feel, Act: March-May 2020
During lockdown we moved elements of this exhibition online experimenting with ways to connect, share, be inspired and keep learning with the help from the King's community and artists. Activities included: Tree Making with Izzy Parker, Live Art Q&A with Jenny Leonard, Zoom: About Trees and a tree making event in Mexico. See related news, and view the Tree Gallery
Imaging Social Justice, 2020-21
A collaboration between the Visual and Embodied Research Methodologies Network (VEM) and the Arts Cabinet which supports the work of PhD students and early career scholars. Imaging encompasses different modalities to make tangible human experiences of everyday violence and struggle for justice. View Imaging Social Justice collection.
Wildfire and Art, 2021-2022
A collaboration between the Leverhulme Centre for Wildfires, Environment and Society and the Arts Cabinet to engage artsist and researchers in an exploration of wildfire. Find out more about art and wildfire.
Reclaiming the Body’s Wisdom, 2020-21
Researchers Dr Camilla Audia and Frances Crowley are collaborating with embodiment practitioner and psychotherapist Helen-Jane (H-J) Ridgeway to develop embodiment tools and ways of working that aim to support both academic staff and students in the virtual learning environment. This project was born from an interest in embodied knowledge whilst exploring the contribution local and tacit knowledge plays in climate and weather forecasting in rural communities in Burkina Faso. They are keen to see how this wisdom of the body could be harnessed to support the online student and teacher experience. Watch the workshop
Multiform Pedagogy in Arts, Health and Wellbeing Education, 2020-2023
King's academic practitioners from the Faculties of Social Science & Public Policy, Dentistry, Oral & Craniofacial Sciences have been awarded a 3 year Erasmus Strategic Partnership Grant led by Turku University. King’s together with 4 other European universities will develop innovative study modules in arts, health and wellbeing education. The aim is to evidence the value of transformational learning strategies on student wellbeing and professional identity formation. The video below shows what happened at the King's movement workshops. Read more
Collaborations
The Arts Cabinet: From 2020 we have partnered to share and experiment with different forms of artistic knowledge production. We are currently piloting three arts-based projects to evidence the value of arts-based practices within social sciences. These are: Migration, Flourishing in the Age of Complexity and Wildfires.
The Arts & Conflict Hub: Based in the Department of War Studies, this international network of scholars and artists were the launch pad for the first exhibition in The Exchange and a catalyst for subsequent creative activities.
King's Cultural Community. We work closely with the King's cultural team, to integrate activities, connect spaces, share expertise and support arts practices which positively impact the King's community and beyond.
Faculty of Dentistry, Oral & Craniofacial Sciences. A team of researchers, clinicians, dance artists and curators are joining forces to pilot a series of arts-based activties for King's students as part of an Erasmus Award.
The Visual & Embodied Research Network (VEM): We work together to create spaces of knowledge-exchange and research excellence around visual, embodied and art-based methodologies. See: Exclusions, VEM+ artist collaborations, watch the VEM+ documentary and the videos with artists at the Festival of Social Sciences
Turku University of Applied Sciences (Erasmus+): The Faculty is partnering with Turku University, Royal College of Music in Stockholm, the University of West Attica and Trinity College Dublin in a 3 year Erasmus Strategic Partnership Grant to develop innovative study modules in arts, health and wellbeing education.