12 February – 4 May 2025
Ticketed
Following acclaimed presentations at both Spike Island (Bristol) and Nottingham Contemporary (Nottingham), Whitechapel Gallery brings this important and timely exhibition of the late British artist Donald Rodney (1961–1998, UK) to London.
His distinctive multi-media works encompass drawing, painting, installation, photography, animatronics and digital media and are known for being bold, acerbic and deeply personal, particularly in their address of the Black British experience in the context of the UK’s colonial history.
Rodney was born in West Bromwich to Jamaican parents, and grew up in Smethwick on the outskirts of Birmingham, an area which became a focus of racist politics in the 1960s. He studied art in Bournville, Nottingham and London throughout the 1980s, and first gained visibility as a member of the Blk Art Group: an association of young Black artists, critics and curators formed in Wolverhampton in 1982 to highlight issues around race and racial identity.
Defying material or thematic categorisation, Rodney’s practice was marked by a commitment to artistic investigation. He continually experimented with new materials and technologies to explore life as a Black man living with a chronic illness.
Rodney lived with sickle cell anaemia and was frequently in and out of hospital, undergoing invasive treatments which led to increasing immobility and profoundly challenging experiences. He harnessed his condition as a way of addressing the many prejudices and injustices he encountered and often used it as a metaphor for the illnesses and injustices of society at large. Rodney maintained a consistent practice of recording his experiences, thoughts, political and artistic concerns in a series of sketchbooks, which were a constant resource for continuing to formulate and testing out new ideas.
At his untimely death in 1998 from complications arising from sickle cell, Rodney left a multifaceted and influential body of work which has influenced artists, writers and filmmakers on both sides of the Atlantic.
This exhibition – developed in collaboration with the Donald Rodney Estate, with loans of work made possible through the Weston Loan Programme with Art Fund – brings together the majority of Rodney’s surviving works from 1982 to 1997, the year before he died.
The title of the exhibition, Visceral Canker, is taken from a 1990 work comprised of two wooden plaques displaying heraldic images, linked together by a system of medical tubes through which theatrical blood is pumped. It exemplifies both the raw, corporal nature of Rodney’s work and politics, and his persistent scrutiny of the ‘canker’, or disease at the heart of society. Through this work, Rodney examines how the inhumanity of Britain’s colonial history continues to structure life today.
Visceral Canker features one of Rodney’s earliest surviving paintings, How the West was Won (1982), made while Rodney was an undergraduate student at Trent Polytechnic (now Nottingham Trent University). It was here that Rodney first met British artist Keith Piper, who became a close friend, and who encouraged him towards a more politically explicit art practice, which allowed him to confront and explore issues of Blackness as a central focus.
The exhibition also includes the seminal work, The House that Jack Built (1987), a mixed media installation featuring a crudely fashioned figure seated in front of a house made of X-rays onto which Rodney added text and drawings. From the late 1980s, Rodney made extensive use of medical X-rays in his work, exploring the creative and metaphoric possibilities of the medium.
Another significant work on display, is the 35mm slide installation Cataract (1991) – the first time it has been reconstructed for public viewing. The work consists of three unsynchronised slide projections that produce overlapping images of four different, fragmented Black male faces, including Rodney’s own, and explores the way constructions of Black masculinity are so often compromised and denied autonomy through prejudicial and reductive stereotypes.
Exclusive to the presentation at Whitechapel Gallery is the inclusion of Camouflage (1997), a major work which Rodney presented at South London Gallery the same year, in what was the last exhibition during his lifetime. It shows a large piece of camouflage fabric, onto which a racist slur is stitched, using lettering cut from the same fabric so that it is barely legible. The work draws attention to the way in which everyday racism can remain an insidious presence, even when not visible on the surface. Also, uniquely on view at Whitechapel Gallery are two artworks based on books: Rodney’s personal copy of the Bible, as well as a plaster cast of the 1984–86 edition of the catalogue for the Arts Council Collection. Both are displayed in close proximity to the work, My Catechism (1997), which comprises plaster casts of the entire set of the Children’s Encyclopaedia Britannica.
Towards the end of his life, Rodney’s practice increasingly broke new ground and works such as Autoicon (1997–2000), an interactive digital artwork initiated by Rodney and finalised by a group of close friends after he died (known as ‘Donald Rodney plc’), anticipated machine learning technologies. Referencing Jeremy Bentham’s infamous nineteenth-century Auto-Icon, the work simulates both the physical presence and creative personality of Rodney. Consisting of a Java-based AI and neural network, the platform engages the user in text-based ‘chat’ and provides responses by drawing from a dense body of data related to Rodney, including documentation of artworks, medical records, interviews, images, notes and videos.
A comprehensive publication, Donald Rodney: A Reader has been produced for the presentation at Whitechapel, featuring contributions from the exhibition’s curators as well as scholars and artists including Celeste-Marie Bernier, Richard Birkett, Eddie Chambers, Janice Cheddie, Alice Correia, Lubaina Himid, Virginia Nimarkoh, Gregory Salter, Maud Sulter, Diane Symons and others, and is available to purchase online and at the gallery for £20.
Donald Rodney: Visceral Canker is curated by Gasworks Director Robert Leckie and Spike Island Director Nicole Yip and adapted for Whitechapel Gallery by Gilane Tawadros, Cameron Foote and Carolina Jozami.
The exhibition is presented in partnership with Spike Island and Nottingham Contemporary and is part of the West of England Visual Arts Alliance programme with loans of works generously supported by the Weston Loan Programme with Art Fund.
Further support come from the Henry Moore Foundation, the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art and the Pilgrim Trust.
Contextual Programmes:
Accompanying the exhibition at Whitechapel Gallery is a rich programme of talks, screenings and archival resources, exploring some of the key themes of the work as well as looking at Rodney’s legacy and ongoing relevance to contemporary culture.
Film Programme – Gallery 2, Free
Curator and writer Richard Birkett, author of Donald Rodney: Autoicon, has created an accompanying programme of contemporary artist films Home as sanctuary as body in a state of siege. This free programme invites further discussion on the relevance and influence of Rodney today, particularly around the intersection of race, disability and technological systems.
Archival Display – Gallery 4, Free
There will also be an extensive display of archival materials that provide illuminating context for the exhibition and Rodney’s approach. From his early days as a student at Trent Polytechnic in Nottingham, to his last solo exhibition at South London Gallery, the display encompasses a range of visual elements that document the rigorous often unconventional research methods that Rodney undertook to inform and develop his practice. The archive illuminates how his creative process was not only shaped by his experience of living with sickle cell anaemia, but also by his belief in collective working alongside his colleagues and friends. The archive also includes photographic documentation of the artist’s lost works, which offers further and invaluable insight into Rodney’s life and career.
Related talks:
About Donald Rodney
Donald Rodney (b. 1961, West Bromwich; d. 1998, London) was a British artist. He was born to Jamaican parents, and grew up in Smethwick, on the outskirts of Birmingham. He studied Art Foundation at Bournville School of Art, Birmingham (1980–81); BA Fine Art at Trent Polytechnic in Nottingham (1981–85); and completed a Postgraduate Diploma in Multi-Media Fine Art at Slade School of Fine Art in London (1987). Rodney first gained visibility as a member of the BLK Art Group in the early 1980s, through a series of exhibitions titled The Pan-Afrikan Connection (1981–84). Rodney’s solo exhibitions include Reimagining Donald Rodney, Vivid Projects, Birmingham (2016); Donald Rodney – In Retrospect, iniva, London (2008); 9 Night in Eldorado, South London Gallery (1997); Cataract, Camerawork, London (1991); Critical, Rochdale Art Gallery (1990); Crisis, Chisenhale Gallery, London (1989); The First White Christmas & Other Empire Stories, Saltley Print and Media, Birmingham (1985); and The Atrocity Exhibition & Other Empire Stories, Black Art Gallery, London (1986). Rodney’s work is in the collections of Tate Gallery, London; Arts Council England; the British Council; the Government Art Collection; Museums Sheffield; the National Galleries of Wales; South London Gallery; Wolverhampton Art Gallery; and Birmingham City Art Gallery.
Notes to Editors
Listing Information
Donald Rodney: Visceral Canker
12 February – 4 May 2025
Admission: £15.00 (Standard ticket); £9.50 (Concessions)
Visitor Information
General Gallery Admission: Free
Opening times: Tuesday – Sunday, 11am – 6pm; Thursdays, 11am – 9pm
Whitechapel Gallery, 77 – 82 Whitechapel High Street, London E1 7QX
T + 44 (0) 20 7522 7888 | E info@whitechapelgallery.org | W whitechapelgallery.org
Press Information
For more information, interviews and images, contact:
Hannah Vitos, Rees & Co | hannah@reesandco.com | +44 (0)20 3137 8776
Will Ferreira Dyke, Whitechapel Gallery | WillFerreiraDyke@whitechapelgallery.org
About Whitechapel Gallery
Whitechapel Gallery was founded in 1901 with the aim to bring great art to the people of East London. From the outset, the Gallery has pushed forward a bold programme of exhibitions and educational activities, driven by the desire to enrich the cultural offer for local communities and provide new opportunities for extraordinary artists from across the globe, to showcase their works to UK audiences, often for the first time.
From ground-breaking solo shows from artists as diverse as Barbara Hepworth (1954), Jackson Pollock (1958), Helio Oiticica (1969), Gilbert & George (1971), Eva Hesse (1979), Frida Kahlo (1982), Sonia Boyce (1988), Sophie Calle (2010), Zarina Bhimji (2012), Emily Jacir (2015), William Kentridge (2016), Theaster Gates (2021) and Nicole Eisenman (2023) to thought-provoking exhibitions that reflect key artistic and cultural concerns, the Gallery’s focus on bringing artists, ideas, and audiences together, remains as important today as it did over a century ago and has helped to cement the East End, as one of the world’s most exciting and diverse cultural quarters.
We are proud to be a Gallery that is locally embedded and globally connected. Its vision, under the Directorship of Gilane Tawadros, is to ensure Whitechapel Gallery claims a distinctive and radical position in the social and cultural landscape, building on its pioneering history as a place for invigorated and inclusive engagement with contemporary art.
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Established in 1958, the Garfield Weston Foundation is a family-founded grant-maker that gives money to support a wide variety of charities across the UK. The Foundation’s funding comes from an endowment of shares in the Weston family business – a successful model that still exists today. The Weston family has a consistent aim. The more successful the family businesses, the more money the Foundation can donate.
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Art Fund is the UK’s independent charity for art, helping museums and people to share in great art and culture for 120 years. Art Fund raises millions of pounds every year to help the UK’s museums, galleries and historic houses. The charity funds art, enabling the UK’s museums to buy and share exciting works, connect with their communities, and inspire the next generation. It builds audiences with its National Art Pass opening doors to great culture; and it amplifies the museum sector through the world’s largest museum prize, Art Fund Museum of the Year, and creative events that bring the UK’s museums together. Art Fund is people-powered by 135,000 members who buy a National Art Pass, and the donors, trusts and foundations who support the charity.
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Supporter Information
Donald Rodney: Visceral Canker has been generously supported by
Weston Loan Programme with Art FundHenry Moore FoundationPaul Mellon Centre for Studies in British ArtPilgrim Trust
With thanks to:West of England Visual Arts Alliance
The exhibition is presented in partnership with Nottingham Contemporary, Spike Island and Whitechapel Gallery.
Will Ferreira Dyke
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