How many times have you cried in a gallery?
A slightly unhinged review of 12 works that itched my brain in 2025
Disclaimers: I don’t own the rights to any of these works. I am mostly sharing terrible unedited photos I took on my fairly old iPhone. I have included artwork/artist/gallery details where I can, please go and deep-dive at your leisure. In case you are new here, I do touch on grief in my writing so please do what you need to with that.
Following up from my 2025 ramble with another year review, this time through art that isn’t mine. I’ve seen a lot this year through travel, nudges from friends, being chronically (horrifically) online and the accessibility to art that living in London affords. I’ve also seen things that I’ve been dying to see for a long time which resulted in a fair bit of public crying. I tried to narrow it down to 12 things I’ve revisited either physically or through gawping at my phone. The ‘reviews’ are roughly in order of when I saw them, they vary in length and mainly come from my gut response. Enjoy!
1. Viviane Sassen, Foam Amsterdam
I entered 2025 in an Uber with my friend on the way to a random party in Amsterdam that we had booked a few days before. As in clocks are striking, fireworks are fireworking and it’s us and our poor driver. In our defence, we landed around 11pm? Much to our surprise, a lot of galleries in Amsterdam are open on New Years Day so we did a few, but Foam is one of my favourites. It reminds me a lot of Autograph in Shoreditch (another favourite). Although my practice is mainly drawing, I used to be an animator so I look at photography/film for composition inspo.
They had a retrospective of Viviane Sassen, whose work I wasn’t familiar with but this series made me gasp. I also did some little scribbles in the gallery. Playing with light/shadow is one of my favourite ways to work, and these did that for me. Also obsessed with this incredible turquoise which is a colour I reach for often when using colour pencils. My grandma bought me a jewellery set with turquoise and pearls which is where that love comes from.
2. J.A Donker Duyvis, Portrait of Anton de Kom, Wereldmuseum
It was my second time seeing this drawing and it slows my heart rate down EVERY. TIME. The colour palette, the gentle expression, the rendering of the hair. I don’t often get to see older works in soft pastel in museums (it’s not everyday oil painting man). I haven’t looked into the artist or sitter and writing this has reminded me to get on to that.
3. Belkis Ayón, Nlloro (Weeping), Modern Art Oxford
I absolutely rinsed the Rail Sale on Trainline and managed to get day trips to Oxford and Manchester for less than £30 all in to see some shows. Incredible work. Also incredible were Belkis’ prints. Some of them are floor to ceiling???? There were very magical circular ones but this one absolutely floored me. A few months before this visit, I made my end of year exhibition selections for my Masters, three days after my Granpa passed. This work summed up were I was at with my grief and all it’s moving parts. There were days I charged through and days I barely knew my own name, but it’s all part of it. I use Belkis as a reference in classes and workshops often, please do take time to find out more about her work and her story. And a huge thank you to the MAO staff who sent me an exhibition catalogue because they had sold out on the day of my visit.
3. Barbara Walker, The Ritual, Whitworth Art Gallery
Yes I went to Manchester and back in one day for this show, I told you this review would be slightly unhinged. There are a few artists that I will regularly travel for their shows if I can (Barbara and Phoebe Boswell mainly). I visited Barbara’s Turner Contemporary takeover a couple of times. It felt like such a gift to see her process unfold. This painting reminded me of a drawing I made a few years ago of my Dad, Granpa and Uncle-in-law playing dominoes, and got me thinking of ways I could push and develop the concept if I were to revisit it.
4. Noah Davis, Painting for my Dad and Seventy Works, Barbican Centre
A questionable quality photocopy of this painting has lived on my studio wall for over two years now. I love work that doesn’t over explain, allows you to fill in the story or project your own on to it. I think Davis has a very special gift for this, and it’s something I try to emulate in my own work. The day after my Granpa passed, I didn’t know what to do with myself so I went to the studio (???) and made a small round drawing after this painting. It has a line from my Granpa’s diary in it that I return to often:
“In life one must never give up because there is a dark shadow hanging over us all, and the best to do is have a lot of patience”
I also really loved the tiny series of collages that Davis made from his hospital bed. It was a reminder that small consistent actions are what pushes your practice forward.
5. Iba N’Diaye, The Blues Singer, Centre Pompidou
I managed to fit a few museum visits around Fête de la Musique in Paris in June. This painting in the Paris Noir show sat next to a large projection of singers and musicians in flow. I’ve been thinking a lot about movement and layering in my work this year so I took quite a bit of time here, trying to absorb the marks and rhythms. And that delicious deep blue.
6. Jenny Saville, National Portrait Gallery
Respectfully, there are no words. It’s Jenny!!! I’ve loved her weird, layered drawings since I stumbled into a show of them at Gagosian in 2016. It was the first encounter I had with a female artist whose was presenting drawings at that scale and with that level of vulnerability in the subject matter. I wished the NPG retrospective had more drawings.
7. Sari Dienes, Richard Saulton Gallery
Warm, creepy hands. Always a yes from me. Also enjoyed the repetition.
8. Madrid highlights
I managed to overlap my Prado residency with the opening of the Maruja Mallo retrospective at the Reina Sofia. Mallo is a Galician surrealist artist (similar time to Leonara Carrington but from the same Spanish region as my mum). I saw this portrait in a class at RDS and it’s lived in my mind since. There’s a serenity mixed with uncertainty in the expression that is unsettling, but still so beautiful. I’m planning new linocut prints for 2026 and this tiny painting of a man on the beach? was a surprising source of inspiration.
I am not typically a still life enthusiast but I visited these grapes most days that I went into the Prado. It’s one of a growing (but still small) number of works by female artists on display. They GLISTEN and literally look like you could pluck them straight off the canvas and eat them. Every day I walked around that museum I saw something new, but I always found my way back to these.
9. Valencia highlights
We took a day trip to Valencia to break up the pace of the month in Madrid. It also allowed me the opportunity to see some of the Sorolla Museum collection while it’s home in Madrid is being refurbished. What struck me most was how similar my colour palette is to his, considering he was making these works over 100 years ago. The fluidity, THE MASTERY OF LIGHT. I wish I had longer here, he was so ahead of his time.
The tiny sketches on old receipts from hotels by Kara Walker at IVAM were a great reminder not to be too precious. The main thing is to turn up for your practice however you can. Loved this cluster of images from a performance work in the Senga Nengundi/Maren Hassinger show there as well. It’s going to take me such a long time to process everything I took in on this trip.
10. Naudline Pierre, James Cohan Gallery at Frieze London
I had initially planned for downtime after Spain but I came back to artworld Christmas (Frieze etc). I also ran a workshop at The Other Art Fair the day after I landed (what even is rest?). Seeing anything from Naudline IRL has been on my bucket list for a biiiiit! I watched an online talk she did (I don’t remember where it was) about the personal mythology and ancestral connections behind her practice, which is something I tap into through my linocuts and work with handmade paints. Ethereal and unapologetic.
11. Lisa Brice, Sadie Coles HQ
It really was the year I saw a bunch of my heroes you know. Brice is one of those artists that tells you an entire narrative in a single image that has very little in it. It’s usually striking, powerful women smoking and drinking alongside feral-looking cats in a limited colour palette. That strength and clarity of vision, and the trust in your craft and the viewer? Magic. I really loved this one in particular for its play with image planes and the subtle but distinct decisions that Brice has made with the shifts of colour in the reflection.
12. Kerry James Marshall, Royal Academy
An insane body of work from a master of his craft. I’m hoping to go back to the show in the new year because I was so IN AWE on this viewing. I just kept sighing and mumbling “FUUUUUCK” because I couldn’t comprehend making work with so much woven into it, and that scale!? Really really impressive.
But the thing that got me most was the intention in every aspect of the work. Meticulous doesn’t even begin to cover it. The little smudge of purple in the bottom right on this painting haunts me, it’s such a clever balancing element that shifts how we digest the overall colour palette. It hasn’t necessarily made me want to make more complex, multi-element works but I do have a deep appreciation for his commitment. That drive to keep questioning and pushing the work to the furthest extent of itself is something I will take into 2026.
In total, I think I cried around 5/6 times in galleries this year? Considering the year I’ve had, that feels fairly light. Thank you for making it to the end of my ramblings! You can see more of my sketchbook scribbles on my website here and I sporadically share them on Instagram too. Hope you have a happy new year, celebrating whatever way makes the most sense to you - I’ll be eating my own weight in snacks with a few people that made me year softer.
🤍✨