Whitechapel Gallery presents the first major UK survey of figurative painter and creator of poetic mise-en-scenes, Kai Althoff (b. 1966 Cologne, Germany; lives and works in New York, USA and Cologne, Germany). The exhibition brings together approximately 90 works spanning Althoff’s career, from childhood drawings and photographs to textilesand new paintings. Read a description of the exhibition from the artist here.
Althoff draws on a wide range of literary, cultural and artistic influences in his work and, for this exhibition at the Whitechapel Gallery, he pays tribute to British potter Bernard Leach(1887–1979). The exhibition features more than 40 of Leach’s ceramic vessels and tiles from the 1920s onwards, selected by Althoff from UK collections and displayed in vitrines designed by the artist. The exhibition takes place in the centenary year of the Leach Pottery in St Ives, founded in 1920 and considered the birthplace of British studio pottery.