Surrealism Comes to the Forefront in Tate’s 2022 Exhibitions

After a turbulent year of disrupted schedules and cancelled shows, the U.K.’s Tate galleries have announced their major exhibitions slated for 2022.

The star attraction is set to be Surrealism Beyond Borders, which will open at London’s Tate Modern next February, and will aim to offer a more global outlook at surrealist art. The movement, which was popularised in the aftermath of World War I, has typically been presented as a European phenomenon, attributed to the likes of Salvador Dalí, René Magritte, Man Ray and Leonora Carrington.

Yet the Tate’s showing will present surrealist works by artists from Tokyo, Mexico City, Cairo, and Martinique, highlighting the global scale of the movement, and acknowledging the contributions of a wider group of creators.

A more global outlook also dominates most of the exhibition schedule, in line with the gallery group’s commitment to improving the diversity of its roster of artists. Tate St. Ives will host a number of exhibitions from global figures, including the Vietnamese artist Thao Nguyen Phan and the Argentinian painter Ad Minoliti. In November, Tate Modern will also launch an exhibition of works by the Polish textile artist Magdalena Abakanowicz.

Alongside that, one major comeback: the revered British artist Lynette Yiadom-Boakye, whose exhibition at Tate Britain was cut short due to lockdowns, will return to the gallery in November to restage her large-scale paintings, which explore contemporary Black identity. After a truncated run this year, the show will finally receive a full three-month run within the space.

For exhibition dates, take a look at Tate’s website. Elsewhere in London, an “immersive Van Gogh experience” has just opened.