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

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Viewing Remi Rough at the House of St Barnabas

The Wick Culture - Remi Rough, installing his work at the House of St Barnabas

Above Remi Rough, installing his work at the House of St Barnabas

Above By Remi Rough

Above Remi Rough, installing his work at the House of St Barnabas

Above By Remi Rough

Remi Rough: What Colour Does For The Fragile Mind
House of St Barnabas, Soho

14 October 2023 – 30 April 2024

Londoners needing their spirits lifted should make a beeline for the House of St Barnabas to see the work of Remi Rough. His colour-saturated, abstract compositions are just the tonic. The hypnotic choreography of line, geometry and colour in his work recalls late 1980’s ‘wildstyle’ graffiti and his own street art beginnings. In ‘What Colour Does For The Fragile Mind,’ some pieces spring forth from the walls of the members’ club, while other works on paper bring a sense of the sculptural to the flat page.

Remi’s joyous compositions are a balm to the weary soul, which will be warmed further still by the fact that proceeds from the exhibition will go towards The House of St Barnabas’ charity, working to empower those affected by homelessness. Art for the heart in more ways than one.

Viewing The Cult of Beauty at the Wellcome Collection

The Wick Culture - 12 Reasons You’re Tired All The Time, Juno Calypso, 2013, courtesy the artist and TJ Boulting. Image: Courtesy of Wellcome Collection

Above 12 Reasons You’re Tired All The Time, Juno Calypso, 2013, courtesy the artist and TJ Boulting. Image: Courtesy of Wellcome Collection

The Wick Culture - The Disobedient Nose: Fig. 1. The reconstruction of a nose 2022, Shirin Fathi, 2022 © Shirin Fathi. Image credit: Courtesy of Wellcome Collection

Above The Disobedient Nose: Fig. 1. The reconstruction of a nose 2022, Shirin Fathi, 2022 © Shirin Fathi. Image credit: Courtesy of Wellcome Collection

Above 12 Reasons You’re Tired All The Time, Juno Calypso, 2013, courtesy the artist and TJ Boulting. Image: Courtesy of Wellcome Collection

Above The Disobedient Nose: Fig. 1. The reconstruction of a nose 2022, Shirin Fathi, 2022 © Shirin Fathi. Image credit: Courtesy of Wellcome Collection

The Cult of Beauty at the Wellcome Collection
Euston Road, London

26 October 2023 to 28 April 2024

Beauty is a slippery idea, something that philosophers, mathematicians, scientists and the rest of us have spent centuries obsessing over and trying to define. The Cult of Beauty at the Wellcome Collection shows how it is not – as the saying goes – in the eye of the bolder. In fact, the objects and artworks in this thought-provoking exhibition reveal how standards of beauty have been set by dominant groups within the rigid boundaries of status, wealth, race, age and gender, among others.

The show will make you question beauty norms and consider more inclusive definitions. Along the way you’ll discover some surprises, like, did you know that beauty spots are thought to have evolved from ‘mouches’ worn by men and women to hide syphilis scars? The height of fashion, apparently.

Some of the intriguing contemporary artworks include The Disobedient Nose, in which Shirin Fathi explores the pressures Iranian women face to undergo cosmetic surgery, and Xcessive Aesthetics’ experiential installation, which shows the opportunities nightclub bathrooms can offer as spaces for experimentation and community building. Next time you hit the town, perhaps you’ll look at your own perfectly imperfect face in the mirror anew.

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.