Artists

Gavin Jantjes

Press release

This timely retrospective of Oxfordshire-based South African painter and printmaker Gavin Jantjes (b. 1948, South Africa) is his largest solo presentation in the UK to date. It brings together more than five decades of the artist’s diverse and distinctive practice.

Through over 100 prints, drawings, and paintings, as well as archival material, the exhibition celebrates Jantjes as a significant and critical agent of change while tracing his development as a painter, printmaker, writer, curator and activist.

The exhibition also focuses on Jantjes’ influence on the cultural landscape of London. His anti-apartheid print series A South African Colouring Book was shown at the ICA in1976, and his role as both exhibiting artist and co-curator in the ground-breaking 1986 Whitechapel Gallery exhibition From Two Worlds cemented his position as a major voice in the UK’s arts scene.

Gavin Jantjes: To Be Free! A Retrospective 1970–2023 is organised by Whitechapel Gallery and Sharjah Art Foundation, in collaboration with The Africa Institute, Sharjah. Curated by Salah M. Hassan. Presentation at Whitechapel Gallery is curated in collaboration with Gilane Tawadros and Cameron Foote.