Dorothea Tanning
Tate Modern, London
27 February – 9 June 2019
Dorothea Tanning, 2019, exhibition view, Tate Modern, London. Courtesy: © Tate photography; photo: Andrew Dunkley
Dorothea Tanning, 2019, exhibition view, Tate Modern, London. Courtesy: © Tate photography; photo: Andrew Dunkley
Dorothea Tanning, 2019, exhibition view, Tate Modern, London. Courtesy: © Tate photography; photo: Andrew Dunkley
Tate Modern, London, in collaboration with the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Madrid, will host the first large-scale exhibition of Dorothea Tanning’s work for 25 years. ‘Dorothea Tanning’ brings together 100 works from the artist’s seven-decade career and is curated by Alyce Mahon, Reader in Modern and Contemporary Art History at the University of Cambridge and Ann Coxon, Curator, International Art, Tate.
Tanning wanted to depict ‘unknown but knowable states’: to suggest there was more to life than meets the eye. The exhibition will follow the story of Tanning’s life and work, from her influential first encounters with avant-garde in New York in the 1930s, through to her later years as a painter, poet and writer. Prominent early works will be brought together, such as the artist’s powerful self-portrait Birthday (1942, Philadelphia Museum of Art). These will join key examples of Tanning’s mid-career prismatic paintings, as well as her later soft sculptures such as Nue Couchée (1969-70, Tate) to show the full breadth of her practice.