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The Whitechapel Gallery is committed to making all of our events as accessible as possible for every audience member. Please contact access@whitechapelgallery.org if you would like to discuss a particular request and we will gladly discuss with you the best way to accommodate it.
– Information about access on site at the gallery is available here https://www.whitechapelgallery.org/visit/access/
– This includes information about Lift access; Borrowing wheelchairs & seating; Assistance Animals; Parking; Toilets and baby care facilities; Blind & Partially Sighted Visitors; Subtitles and transcripts; British Sign Language (BSL) and hearing induction loops; Deaf Messaging Service (DMS).
About This Event
– This event takes place in Gallery 2 at Whitechapel Gallery, located on the ground floor.
– You must purchase a ticket to attend the event. Concession tickets are available. If you require a Personal Assistant to support your attendance, we can offer them a seat free of charge, but it must be arranged in advance.
– If the ticket price affects your attendance, please email tickets@whitechapelgallery.org to be added to the guest list (no questions asked, but dependent on availability).
– This event is suitable for those over the age of 16
– We are unable to provide British Sign Language interpretation for this event
– We are unable to provide live closed captioning or CART for this event.
– This event last approximately 1.5 hours. There are no rest breaks currently scheduled during this event.
– An audio recording of the event can be obtained by emailing publicprogrammes@whitechapelgallery.org following the event.
Transport
– To the best of our knowledge, there are no planned disruptions to local transport on the date of the event.
– Our nearest train station – Aldgate East Underground (1 min) is not wheelchair accessible. The closest wheelchair accessible stations are Whitechapel (15 min), Shoreditch High Street (15 min) or Liverpool Street (15 min).
– Free parking for Blue Badge holders is available at the top of Osborn Street in the pay and display booths for an unlimited period. Spaces are available on a first come, first served basis.
Live Recording
Please note: we audio record all events for the Whitechapel Gallery Archive and possible future online publication via Soundcloud.
This event is fully booked. To join the waiting list, please call the box office on 020 7522 7888.
Join artist and educator Sonia Boyce in conversation with Director of the Whitechapel Gallery Gilane Tawadros, as they speak to the changes and transformations in her interdisciplinary artistic practice across time and unpack her new exhibition at the gallery An Awkward Relation.
Especially conceived to be in dialogue with Lygia Clark’s exhibition The I and the You, Boyce was introduced to Clark’s work in the 1990s and felt a strong synergy with the Brazilian artist’s experiential and participatory practice. An Awkward Relation brings together a number of pivotal and rarely seen works to explore themes of interaction, participation and improvisation – all of which have played a definitive role in Boyce’s practice since the 1990s and reflect a shared interest with many of the radical approaches that Lygia Clark pioneered in her work.
An Awkward Relation explores the feelings of both involvement and uneasiness intrinsic to an approach that invites visitors to engage, touch and experience artworks and their surroundings in new and unscripted ways. The title of the exhibition is indicative of this complex, often difficult, relationship between artists, works and audiences. It also recognises that while there are similarities between Boyce and Clark’s work, there are also clear differences which necessarily, and inevitably, stem from the very different artistic, geographical and socio-political contexts in which the artists were working, as well as the specific intentions behind what they were doing.
The talk will end with a Q&A and the chance for you to put your questions directly to Boyce and Tawadros.
Dame Sonia Boyce DBE RA (b. London, 1962) is an interdisciplinary artist and academic working across film, drawing, photography, print, sound, and installation. In 2022, she presented FEELING HER WAY for the British Pavilion at the 59th Venice Biennale for which she was awarded the Golden Lion for Best National Participation. Boyce came to prominence in the early 1980s as a key figure in the burgeoning British Black Arts Movement with figurative pastel drawings and photo collages that addressed issues of race and gender in Britain. Since the 1990s, Boyce has shifted significantly to embrace a social practice that invites improvisation, collaboration, movement, and sound with other people. Working across a range of media, Boyce’s practice today is focused on questions of artistic authorship and cultural difference.
In 2016, Boyce was elected to the Royal Academy of Arts in London and in 2023, she was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Science in Boston. In 2014 she became a Professor at University of the Arts London, where she holds the inaugural Chair in Black Art & Design. In the 2024 King’s New Year Honours List, Boyce was awarded a Damehood. Her work is in many UK and international museum collections including TATE, London; Saastamoinen Foundation, Finland; Centre Pompidou, France and Hirschhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, USA.
