Exhibition projects curated by this year’s MA Curating students will launch at four locations across London later this month.
MA Curating at the Courtauld offers an unmatched opportunity for students to immerse themselves in the theory and practice of curating in a unique scholarly and professional context.
The four projects will open at St Mary le Strand and Strand Aldwych in central London, Nicoletta Fiorucci Foundation in Chelsea, Strawberry Hill House & Garden in Twickenham and the Freud Museum in Hampstead, North London, and will be accompanied by a scheduled programme of public events.
Interested in pursuing a curatorial career? Apply now to study MA Curating at the Courtauld Institute in September 2026. Applications close 6 August 2026.
Searching for Lost Rain – (27 May – 4 June 2026)
A curatorial project focused on artworks by Gala Porras-Kim presented at St Mary le Strand Church and the surrounding public space of Strand Aldwych, London.
Bringing together two works, Precipitation for an Arid Landscape (2021 – ongoing) and Mediating with the Rain (2021 – ongoing), the exhibition examines what happens when sacred or culturally specific objects are removed from the conditions that once gave them meaning. Gala Porras-Kim is a Los Angeles-based interdisciplinary artist and current resident at Somerset House Studios, London.
A corresponding Research Forum Symposium will take place at the Courtauld on 1 June, with a Panel discussion and choral response at St Mary le Strand on 2 June.
Paper Castle – (6 – 21 June 2026)
This exhibition at Strawberry Hill House & Garden, Twickenham, features artists including Tim Etchells, Prem Sahib, David Begbie, Eva Fisahn, Klara Fokicheva, Manuel Alejandro Hernández Rivera, Annemarieke Kloosterhof, Alison Watt, David Weatherburn and Lottie Wilson.
Taking its title from Horace Walpole’s own description of Strawberry Hill, Paper Castle explores themes of visual deception, ghostliness and artifice, encouraging visitors to question what they think they know. Contemporary artworks unfold throughout the historic interiors, dissolving into walls, interrupting familiar spaces and inviting visitors to look again at the stories embedded within the house.
“The stairway that separates my room from my memory” – (4 – 20 June 2026)
This exhibition at the Nicoletta Fiorucci Foundation, brings together works from the Nicoletta Fiorucci Collection alongside existing and newly commissioned works by other artists, authors, and filmmakers, the exhibition and its related events explore how notions of home shift through migration, exile, and diaspora.
The presented works reflect experiences of both voluntary and forced migration, tracing how home is carried across borders and reconstructed through memory, objects, and images. Landscapes, domestic spaces, and personal archives reveal identity as fluid, provisional, and continually negotiated.
Featuring works by Etel Adnan, Jonathas de Andrade, Atef Alshaer, KV Duong, Elçin Ekinci, Alia Farid, Betty C Fan, Simone Fattal, José García Oliva, Alya Hatta, Mona Hatoum, Hiwa K., Mar Kristoff, Narges Mohammadi, Gerhard Richter, Ania Soliman, Zineb Sedira, Kudzanai Violet Hwami, Želimir Žilnik.
An accompanying public programme, in partnership with the Institute of Contemporary Arts, London, and Fondazione In Between Art Film, will invite audiences to reconsider homemaking as an ongoing act of belonging, repair, and transformation.
Leonora Carrington: Navigating a world Down Below – (28 – 29 May 2026)
This conference is organised in conjunction with the Freud Museum’s current exhibition, The Symptomatic Surreal, curated by Vanessa Boni. The two-day conference begins with an introductory evening at the Freud Museum, followed by a full-day programme at the Courtauld’s Research Forum, bringing together an international panel of Carrington scholars with contributions from Alyce Mahon, Felicity Gee, Helen Bremm, Victoria Ferentinou, and Sarah Wilson.
Symposium – Day 1: Freud Museum, 28 May 2026
18:00 – 21:00 – Book now
Symposium – Day 2: Courtauld Research Forum, Vernon Square, 29 May 2026
10:00 – 19:00 – Book now
Fragments from the Horse Who Knows History (14 June 2026)
Performance by Rose English at the Freud Museum, with music by Ian Hill.
‘this is the imprint of the horse who knows history seeking the archaeology of our own understanding’
Rose English. Rosita Clavel – a horse opera libretto text, (1997)
Rose English narrates the horse in words and pictures from both her work and the work of Leonora Carrington, tracing histories of horse legends from the cavalry to Country Life, from Bucephalus to bridles. Sitting in Maresfield Gardens, in the embrace of Freud’s own collection of antiquities, Rose opens up an underworld channel to enable Epona’s Wise Mares to converse with Carrington’s Steeds.
