Many Stories

Many Stories is the first major UK exhibition of figurative painting by women artists from the South Asian diaspora. It will bring together works by 17 artists, including both emerging and established practitioners.

The exhibition presents diverse visual languages, incorporating Western and South Asian painting traditions to depict natural and urban landscape, the body, portraiture and painterly process. As the title suggests, Many Stories reveals multiple perspectives of the lives, critical concerns and aesthetic interests of some of the most engaging South Asian British women artists today, including Faiza Butt, Jai Chuhan, Jasmir Creed and Naira Mushtaq.

Many Stories presents difference as much as connection across three core themes: Identity and Migration, Body and Women Painting Women, and Navigating the Public and Private. Across generations, geographies and practices, the exhibition explores where differing perspectives meet, where they diverge and what they reveal about the changing landscape of contemporary British painting.

The exhibition also plays an important role in addressing the continued under-representation of South Asian British women within the visual arts and comes at a time of renewed interest in figurative painting and in broader accounts of British art, showcasing a remarkable body of works together at scale.

Many Stories is undertaken in partnership with Midlands Arts Centre, Birmingham, and Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool. A new publication and public programme will accompany the exhibition, enabling visitors the chance to delve deeper into the work of the artists and the themes addressed in the exhibition.