Our top picks of exhibitions together with cultural spaces and places, both online and in the real world.

All, Art, Auctions, Exhibitions, Travel & Hospitality, Initiatives

Viewing Gucci Cosmos at 180 The Strand

The Wick Culture - Gucci Cosmos. Photography: Angnese Bedini

Above Gucci Cosmos. Photography: Angnese Bedini

The Wick Culture - Gucci Cosmos. Courtesy Gucci

Above Gucci Cosmos. Courtesy Gucci

Above Gucci Cosmos. Photography: Angnese Bedini

Above Gucci Cosmos. Courtesy Gucci

Above Gucci Cosmos. Photography: Angnese Bedini

Above Gucci Cosmos. Courtesy Gucci

Above Gucci Cosmos. Photography: Angnese Bedini

Above Gucci Cosmos. Courtesy Gucci

Gucci Cosmos
180 Studios, 180 The Strand

11 October to 31 December 2023

Fashionistas listen up. The art of fashion is here. Travelling exhibition, Gucci Cosmos, has touched down at London’s 180 The Strand and wow it’s making a buzz – as you can see before you even reach the show, thanks to the buses zipping around the capital adorned with Cosmos colours.

Curated by fashion critic Maria Luisa Frisa and first shown in Shanghai, it takes viewers on an immersive tour of the Italian fashion house’s past, present and future. Stage design master Es Devlin, hailed for her technological and artistic innovations, conceived the sets for its first outing and has rebooted the installation for London. With her help, Gucci Cosmos aims to entrance and discombobulate in equal measure.

The journey charting a 102 colourful history of fashion begins with a recreation of the red-lacquered elevator of The Savoy, where the house’s eponymous founder Guccio Gucci worked as a humble bellboy as a young man at the end of the 19th century, before leading visitors through a maze-like series of revolving doors opening onto different rooms and worlds. Highlights include a space filled with floating flowers and bees to evoke Gucci’s signature ‘Flora’ motif, and ‘Zoetrope’, recalling Eadweard Muybridge’s 1878 moving-image invention, in which ghostly horse animations appear on equestrian-inspired pieces from Gucci’s archives. You’ll definitely want to be FROW for this exhibition.

Doing London Creates: a campaign to celebrate the capital’s culture

The Wick Culture - Zak Ové's The Mothership Connection, 2021, at Frieze Sculpture Park 2023. Photography: Linda Nylind. Courtesy of Linda Nylind / Frieze.

Above Zak Ové’s The Mothership Connection, 2021, at Frieze Sculpture Park 2023. Photography: Linda Nylind. Courtesy of Linda Nylind / Frieze.

Spotlighting London’s cultural magnetism

The great and the good of the artworld came together in pilgrimage during Frieze Week to launch London Creates, a campaign to give fresh momentum to our great capital’s visual arts scene and celebrate its place at the centre of the world’s cultural map. Despite the challenges of the pandemic, the UK’s art market remains bigger than the rest of Europe’s combined and London is bursting with the greatest concentration of artists of any city in the world, alongside a rich ecosystem of top arts universities, and more than 200 museums and 800 galleries. Museum directors are the new rockstars in town.

Created in conjunction with the GLA Mayor’s Office led by Justine Simons, Evening Standard’s culture champion Editor in Chief Dylan Jones and Jane Boardman of M&C Saatchi, the goal is clear – spotlighting the contribution that culture makes to our economy (some £58 billion a year) and to people’s quality of life. All hail the big smoke as the city of culture. Leading artists, gallerists, museum directors, auction houses and media editors will be part of the mission as London Creates flies the flag for the capital’s culture. The Wick is proud to be an official partner, continuing our mission to open up expert art world perspectives and incubate fresh talent, alongside world leading visual artists and creatives.

Visiting Marina Abramović at the Royal Academy

The Wick Culture - Marina Abramović, The Current, 2017. Video; 1 hour 35 mins. Courtesy of the Marina Abramović Archives. © Marina Abramović

Above Marina Abramović, The Current, 2017. Video; 1 hour 35 mins. Courtesy of the Marina Abramović Archives. © Marina Abramović

The Wick Culture - Marina Abramović, The House with the Ocean View, 2002. Performance; 12 days. Sean Kelly Gallery, New York. Courtesy of the Marina Abramović Archives © Marina Abramović. Photo: Attilio Maranzano

Above Marina Abramović, The House with the Ocean View, 2002. Performance; 12 days. Sean Kelly Gallery, New York. Courtesy of the Marina Abramović Archives © Marina Abramović. Photo: Attilio Maranzano

The Wick Culture - Marina Abramović, Rhythm 0, 1974. Performance; Studio Morra, Naples. Courtesy of the Marina Abramović Archives. © Marina Abramović. Photo: Donatelli Sbarra

Above Marina Abramović, Rhythm 0, 1974. Performance; Studio Morra, Naples. Courtesy of the Marina Abramović Archives. © Marina Abramović. Photo: Donatelli Sbarra

The Wick Culture - Ulay / Marina Abramović, Imponderabilia, 1977. Galleria Communale d’Arte Moderna, Bologna. Courtesy of the Marina Abramović Archives. © Ulay / Marina Abramović

Above Ulay / Marina Abramović, Imponderabilia, 1977. Galleria Communale d’Arte Moderna, Bologna. Courtesy of the Marina Abramović Archives. © Ulay / Marina Abramović

Above Marina Abramović, The Current, 2017. Video; 1 hour 35 mins. Courtesy of the Marina Abramović Archives. © Marina Abramović

Above Marina Abramović, Rhythm 0, 1974. Performance; Studio Morra, Naples. Courtesy of the Marina Abramović Archives. © Marina Abramović. Photo: Donatelli Sbarra

Above Ulay / Marina Abramović, Imponderabilia, 1977. Galleria Communale d’Arte Moderna, Bologna. Courtesy of the Marina Abramović Archives. © Ulay / Marina Abramović

Marina Abramović
Royal Academy, Burlington House, Piccadilly

23 September 2023 – 1 January 2024

The art of life. World renowned Marina Abramović has spent more than five decades stretching the limits of her own physical and mental tolerance through her work. The Serbian performance artist has had her clothes ripped and rose thorns stuck into her stomach by members of the public (in Rhythm 0, 1974) and survived on water alone while living inside a New York gallery for 12 days (The House with the Ocean View, 2002) – feats of endurance that are all represented at the Royal Academy’s not-to-be-missed survey of her work. She is the first female to hit the RA with a solo exhibition in 250 Years.

The exhibition explores human connection and trauma before shifting gear to a more peaceful and transcendent tone, as we see Marina’s own journey through life evolve. Video installations are spliced with four of her seminal performance pieces, reperformed by artists live at the Royal Academy, including the blush-inducing Imponderabilia, 1977, in which gallery-goers have to squeeze their way through two nude artists in a doorway to get from one room to another. At every turn the human body and how we use it as a tool to confront mental challenge is the star of the show. What strikes is Marina’s ability to capture the uncomfortable – those moments of pivot between joy and pain. Ultimately, this is an exhibition about what it means to be human.