Welcome to the IanVisits alternative guide to London.
Lectures, talks, heritage events, organised walks and other random geeky miscellany.
This is quite an old listings page, did you want: Saturday, 16th March 2024?
Displayed in date order by how soon they close.
Free
‘Mobilise! Mobilise!
Drawing inspiration from photographs, artist Niki Gibbs worked with Holloway Fire Station on Hornsey Road, Islington, to capture its four crews going about their routine daily work. (Ending Soon Tue, 17th Mar)
Islington Museum
Exploring the fascinating world of mushrooms, in an exhibition from curator and writer, Francesca Gavin. (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
Somerset House
£13
Steve McQueen
Tate Modern presents the first major exhibition of Steve McQueen’s artwork in the UK for 20 years (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
Tate Modern
An exhibition by Keith van Loen of a series of photographic images examining how modernist architecture is defined. (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
Barbican Centre
An exhibition telling the story of the Old Lady through items selected from the vast collections amassed since the Bank was
founded in 1694. (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
Bank of England Museum
This is the first time that Tate has staged a show devoted to the later 17th century and the first to explore baroque art in Britain. (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
Tate Britain
Come and admire the rare and historic Camellias in the Grade 1 listed Conservatory, a gorgeous array of blooms; pink, red, white and striped. (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
Chiswick House and Gardens
As we approach another major turning point in automotive design, this exhibition looks at the role of the car in shaping the world we live in today. (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
Victoria and Albert Museum
This exhibition visits each stage of the production process; from design to construction, sourcing and alterations, to dressing, repairs and laundering. (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
The National Theatre
Intrinsically bound to German identity and the upheaval that followed the First World War, Notgeld is a fascinating microcosm of public feeling in post-war Germany. (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
The British Museum
This exhibition shines a spotlight on the subject we’d all rather avoid, from ancient societies to modern day medicine. (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
The Octagon Gallery
An immersive installation by contemporary American artist Darren Waterston, presenting a detailed reimagining of James Abbott McNeill Whistler’s famed Peacock Room. (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
Victoria and Albert Museum
This is the first UK exhibition of works by Indian master painters commissioned by East India Company officials in the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
Wallace Collection
The first ever retrospective of the Polish-Jewish émigré who brought European modernist aesthetics to British graphic design. (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
House of Illustration
£13.50
George IV: Art & Spectacle
This exhibition presents George IV's life through the art that enriched his world. (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
The Queen's Gallery
Free
Heritage display
A small heritage gallery in the basement of the Guildhall currently has three documents on display. (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
Guildhall Art Gallery and Roman Amphitheater
Hidden London - The Exhibition takes people on an immersive journey of some of London’s most secret spaces belonging to the oldest subterranean railway in the world (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
London Transport Museum
Free
Kara Walker
The Tate Modern hall is filled with a 13-metre tall working fountain inspired by the Victoria Memorial in front of Buckingham Palace, London. (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
Tate Modern
Pictures of Gay Pride marches in the 1970s, controversial actor and singer Divine and London’s first gay superclub, Bang, are among rarely seen photographs that have just gone on show. (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
City of Westminster Town Hall
A selection from a gift of nine ‘manner posters’ displayed across Tokyo’s Seibu Railway network between 2016 and 2019. (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
Victoria and Albert Museum
This display brings together a wide range of palaeoart, from nearly 200 years ago to the present day. (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
Natural History Museum
Alongside a select number of key paintings and sculptures, an exhibition reveals how paper allowed Picasso to push the boundaries of thought and practice. (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
Royal Academy of Arts
Free
Slices of Time
The complexity and delightful aesthetic fills space with cut out coloured paper to create a world where the essence of every carefully considered colour can be appreciated. (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
Now Gallery
This exhibition marks 50 years since the beginnings of two significant social movements in the UK: the first women’s liberation conference in Oxford and the first UK meeting of the Gay Liberation Front at LSE. (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
LSE Library
Free
Space Frames
Glowing arches fill Granary Square at Kings Cross during the winter months. (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
Granary Square
Discover the creative process behind designing for performance, from costume to set design (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
Victoria and Albert Museum
Tangerine Dream, the German band widely credited as laying the foundations for the Ambient and Trance music styles, will be celebrated by this exhibition. (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
Barbican Arts Centre
A display celebrating The Clash’s iconic London Calling – an album that rocked the music scene, serving as an anthem for London, Londoners and music lovers globally. (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
Museum of London
Explore one of the most audacious crimes of the 20th Century and the subsequent investigation, alongside other stories of crime through the post. (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
The Postal Museum
A display exploring the unique and largely untold history, heritage and culture of the Krio people of Sierra Leone. (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
Museum of London Docklands
Free
The New Stone Age
The New Stone Age exhibition will celebrate the sustainability, practicality and inherent beauty of stone. (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
The Building Centre
This exhibition, in the Weston Room at the Maughan Library, marks the 75th anniversary of VE day and the liberation of the Nazi death and concentration camps. (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
Maughan Library
This exhibition reveals the architectural setting of swimming and bathing from Roman springs and Victorian bathhouses to contemporary swimming spaces. (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
Victoria and Albert Museum
This exhibition looks at the 100-year anniversary of the Royal Society of Medicine’s Urology Section. (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
The Royal Society of Medicine
Free
Tribute Ink
Explore the tattoos worn by members of the Armed Forces community and the powerful stories of identity, comradeship, bravery and sacrifice they represent. (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
National Army Museum
Peeling back the surface of existence to reveal what lies under the skin. An exhibition exploring the unsettling beauty of the human body from the medieval age to the contemporary world. (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
Royal College of Physicians Museum
Explore the contrasting worlds of Japan’s urban future and rural traditions in WOW’s new digital art installation. (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
Japan House
Japan House presents two installations by WOW looking at both the urban future and timelessness of rural Japan. (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
Japan House London
The fifty-fifth Wildlife Photographer of the Year exhibition will immerse you in the breathtaking diversity of the natural world. (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
Natural History Museum
This exhibition commemorates 100 years of nursing registration in the UK by delving into the heated arguments that characterised the registration debate. (Ending Soon Wed, 18th Mar)
Royal College of Nursing Library & Heritage Centre
£16
Among the Trees
This exhibition brings together artworks that explore our relationships with trees and forests. (Ending Soon Sun, 17th May)
Hayward Gallery
An exhibition of superb images reproduced from the British Library’s collection of Japanese pattern books. (Ending Soon Sun, 17th May)
The British Library
Through the medium of film and photography, this major exhibition considers how masculinity has been coded, performed, and socially constructed from the 1960s to the present day. (Ending Soon Sun, 17th May)
Barbican Centre
See original artwork created by Henny Beaumont for the Legal Action Group's (LAG) children's book, 'Equal to Everything: Judge Brenda and the Supreme Court'. (Ending Soon Fri, 22nd May)
The Supreme Court
To coincide with JMW Turner featuring on the new £20 note, find out about the variety of stock purchases made by Turner in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. (Ending Soon Fri, 22nd May)
Bank of England Museum
On display will be fossil skeletons as well as full-size models and animatronics that bring the Permian back to life. (Ending Soon Sat, 23rd May)
Horniman Museum
This immersive experience charts their music, lyrics, creative process and influence as one of the most iconic pop bands of the modern age. (Ending Soon Sat, 23rd May)
O2 Arena / Millennium Dome
£16
Aubrey Beardsley
The largest exhibition of his drawings for 50 years. (Ending Soon Sat, 23rd May)
Tate Britain
From ‘honey dew’ drinking parties to Mrs Tiggy-Winkle, discover Beatrix Potter’s response to the world of fairies and fairytales. (Ending Soon Sat, 23rd May)
Victoria and Albert Museum
Free
Becket2020
See a collection of pilgrim badges that illustrate the extraordinary life of Thomas Becket. (Ending Soon Sat, 23rd May)
Museum of London
This exhibition explores the extravagant world of the glamorous and stylish ‘Bright Young Things’ of the twenties and thirties, seen through the eye of renowned British photographer Cecil Beaton. (Ending Soon Sat, 23rd May)
National Portrait Gallery
The exhibition explores Victorian London from the 1830s until the turn of the twentieth century, focusing on Dickens’s child characters. (Ending Soon Sat, 23rd May)
Senate House Library
The first major exhibition devoted to David Hockney’s drawings in over twenty years. (Ending Soon Sat, 23rd May)
National Portrait Gallery
For the first time in over 40 years, the British Museum is showing a major display of its collection of French prints, one of the best collections of its kind in the world. (Ending Soon Sat, 23rd May)
The British Museum
Featuring over 35 paintings and drawings from collections across the world, the exhibition spans Maes’s whole career, spent in Dordrecht and Amsterdam. (Ending Soon Sat, 23rd May)
The National Gallery
£14
Spilliaert
This is the first monographic exhibition of Spilliaert’s work in the UK and will showcase some 90 works on paper. (Ending Soon Sat, 23rd May)
Royal Academy of Arts
The UK’s first public exhibition dedicated solely to gay cultural icon Tom of Finland (born Touko Laaksonen) on the centenary of his birth. (Ending Soon Sat, 23rd May)
House of Illustration
Free
William Wordsworth
See original drafts of Wordsworth’s verse, his notebooks, correspondence and more. (Ending Soon Sat, 23rd May)
The British Library
In her bicentenary year the Museum is celebrating the life and legacy of the lesser known aspects of Nightingale’s life with this exciting new exhibition (Ending Soon Sun, 1st Nov)
Florence Nightingale Museum
