Material Worlds - Contemporary Art and Textiles

Sat 17 May – Sun 31 Aug 2025  

Opening times: Tuesday-Saturday, 10am-4pm; Sunday, 12noon-4pm; Closed Mondays 

Djanogly Gallery 

Free admission 

Launch event: Friday 16 May, 7-9pm 

Material Worlds is an ambitious, free, group exhibition exploring how contemporary artists are using textiles in surprising and radical ways. 

Often incorporated as part of a wider artistic practice, the everyday, intimate and accessible quality of textiles is used to create works that are theatrical, bold, unsettling and humorous. 

The artists in this exhibition share a deep awareness of the cultural significance of textiles, alongside a desire to test their potential as a medium for contemporary art. The familiar, material stuff of everyday life is transformed into the unexpected – the ordinary made extraordinary – to explore ideas of the body, identity, gender, race, heritage, myth and folklore. 

Material Worlds has been curated by Caroline Achaintre. A Hayward Gallery Touring exhibition from the Southbank Centre, London. Supported by Leonard Design.