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Viewing The Power of Trees at Kew Gardens

The Wick Culture - Horizontal–Vaakasuora by Eija-Liisa Ahtila. Image courtesy of Kew Gardens

Above Horizontal–Vaakasuora by Eija-Liisa Ahtila. Image courtesy of Kew Gardens

The Wick Culture - Susan Conroy, Ginkgo Biloba. Image courtesy of Kew Gardens

Above Susan Conroy, Ginkgo Biloba. Image courtesy of Kew Gardens

The Wick Culture - The Power of Trees at Kew Gardens. Image courtesy of Kew Gardens

Above The Power of Trees at Kew Gardens. Image courtesy of Kew Gardens

Above Horizontal–Vaakasuora by Eija-Liisa Ahtila. Image courtesy of Kew Gardens

Above Susan Conroy, Ginkgo Biloba. Image courtesy of Kew Gardens

Above The Power of Trees at Kew Gardens. Image courtesy of Kew Gardens

The Power of Trees

Kew Gardens
12 April – 14 September 2025

The latest seasonal show at Kew is now open, and ode to the enduring power and beauty of trees, in nature, art and culture. Kew itself is home to 14,000 trees – and is the perfect place to honour them as a muse to artists over the centuries.

A range of works is on show until September at the Shirley Sherwood Gallery of Botanical Art, a hub for botanical art opened a decade ago by Sir David Attenborough to house the astonishing collection of Dr Shirely Sherwood, with Kew’s own collection numbering more than 200,000 pieces of Botanical art.

A highlight of The Power of Trees is a multi-sensory piece by Finnish visual artist Eija-Liisa Ahtila, Horizontal–Vaakasuora, a portrait of a 30-metre spruce found in Finland’s boreal forest. With sound effects evoking the tree’s natural habitat, it’s a captivating and poignant piece, and a testament to the grandeur and majesty of one of our greatest natural wonders.

Viewing Amoako Boafo at Gagosian London

The Wick Culture - Amoako Boafo, Amidst Tulips, 2025. © Amoako Boafo, Photo: Prudence Cuming Associates Ltd, Courtesy Gagosian

Above Amoako Boafo, Amidst Tulips, 2025. © Amoako Boafo, Photo: Prudence Cuming Associates Ltd, Courtesy Gagosian

The Wick Culture - Amoako Boafo, Black Cycle, 2025. © Amoako Boafo, Photo: Joe Humphrys, Courtesy Gagosian

Above Amoako Boafo, Black Cycle, 2025. © Amoako Boafo, Photo: Joe Humphrys, Courtesy Gagosian

The Wick Culture - Amoako Boafo, Shoulder Stand, 2023. Amoako Boafo, Black Cycle, 2025. © Amoako Boafo, Photo: Prudence Cuming Associates Ltd, Courtesy Gagosian

Above Amoako Boafo, Shoulder Stand, 2023. Amoako Boafo, Black Cycle, 2025. © Amoako Boafo, Photo: Prudence Cuming Associates Ltd, Courtesy Gagosian

Above Amoako Boafo, Amidst Tulips, 2025. © Amoako Boafo, Photo: Prudence Cuming Associates Ltd, Courtesy Gagosian

Above Amoako Boafo, Black Cycle, 2025. © Amoako Boafo, Photo: Joe Humphrys, Courtesy Gagosian

Above Amoako Boafo, Shoulder Stand, 2023. Amoako Boafo, Black Cycle, 2025. © Amoako Boafo, Photo: Prudence Cuming Associates Ltd, Courtesy Gagosian

Amoako Boafo: I Do Not Come to You by Chance

Gagosian
April 10–May 24, 2025

Amoako Boafo needs no introduction: the 40 year-old Ghanaian portraitist is celebrated around the world for his luminous, bold and original figurative paintings. He’s partnered in the past with Dior (a collaborative collection was released in 2021), and has painted on Jeff Bezos’s rocket ship. His works today regularly achieve seven figures at auction.

Boafo joined Gagosian in 2022, and this exhibition – his first UK solo show – is on view at the gallery’s Grosvenor Hill location. It is also his first solo exhibition in the UK. It’s title, I Do Not Come to You By Chance, is after Nigerian novelist Adaobi Tricia Nwaubani’s 2009 novel – a humorous and poignant story of the conflicts and contradictions of contemporary life. The title places Boafo’s portraits too in the realm of rich contemporary African storytelling, able to make the personal feel epic and the universal feel intimate.

He has taken over the large galleries with paintings, but also an installation recreating the courtyard of his childhood home in Ghana, made with architect Glenn DeRoche. The exhibition includes a large number of new and recent self-portraits, including with the artist’s young son, and paintings of friends and family – their tactility and texture comes in part from Boafo’s innovative technique of painting with his fingers. “I make paintings that allow me to celebrate where I come from and what I aspire to be, while sharing unique perspectives and understanding”, the artist says.

Viewing Rose Wylie at David Zwirner

The Wick Culture - Rose Wylie, Henry Triangle, 1996. Image courtesy of the artist and David Zwirner

Above Rose Wylie, Henry Triangle, 1996. Image courtesy of the artist and David Zwirner

The Wick Culture - Rose Wylie, Nebuchadnezzar's Dream, 2023. Image courtesy of the artist and David Zwirner

Above Rose Wylie, Nebuchadnezzar’s Dream, 2023. Image courtesy of the artist and David Zwirner

The Wick Culture - Rose Wylie, Lilith and Gucci Boy, 2024. Image courtesy of the artist and David Zwirner

Above Rose Wylie, Lilith and Gucci Boy, 2024. Image courtesy of the artist and David Zwirner

Above Rose Wylie, Henry Triangle, 1996. Image courtesy of the artist and David Zwirner

Above Rose Wylie, Nebuchadnezzar’s Dream, 2023. Image courtesy of the artist and David Zwirner

Above Rose Wylie, Lilith and Gucci Boy, 2024. Image courtesy of the artist and David Zwirner

Rose Wylie: When Found becomes Given

David Zwirner
April 3—May 23, 2025

The inimitable British painter Rose Wylie returns to London this week with her latest body of works, going on show at David Zwirner. Jennifer Higgie describes Wylie’s world as “not neat” but embodying something “very human”, and it is this chaotic, exuberant, vitality that makes Wylie so unique as an artist.

In this exhibition, titled ‘When Found becomes Given’, new and recent canvases and multipanel works blur the realms of the personal, symbolic, and historical—inhabiting real and imagined timelines, confusing our sense of any linear chronology (much like life itself). Colourful and witty, these paintings reveal Wylie’s recent formal interest in composition. Depicting apparently disparate things and often referencing history, contemporary culture and dreams, these paintings appear to hum and whir with their own wonderful rhythms.

This show is a taster of what is to come at the Royal Academy of Arts next year, when Wylie will have a major solo exhibition across the main galleries.