Frieze 2025 at Cork Street

Cork Street Galleries is thrilled to announce its annual Frieze week programme, highlighting exhibitions, extended opening hours, and special events that will take place on the Mayfair street during Frieze London and Frieze Masters, Wednesday 15 – Sunday 19 October 2025.

As part of the celebrations, CATALOGUE will launch its special issue, ‘Fear Gives Wings to Courage’, marking 100 years of Cork Street as a hub for modern and contemporary art. The magazine features contributions from Louisa Buck, Shirin Neshat, and Gareth Harris – fantastic and insightful reads with more to be revealed soon. It’s not to be missed.

The street’s permanent roster of galleries, including Alison Jacques, Alon Zakaim Fine Art, Flowers Gallery, Frieze No.9 Cork Street, Goodman Gallery, Holtermann Fine Art, MASSIMODECARLO, Messums London, Helly Nahmad Gallery, Osborne Samuel, The Redfern Gallery, Sam Fogg, Stephen Friedman Gallery, Tiwani Contemporary, and Waddington Custot, together have announced 18 exhibitions to celebrate the busiest and most exciting week in London’s art calendar.

FLOWERS GALLERY (21 Cork Street) presents ‘David Hepher: The Elegy of Robin Hood Gardens’, a solo exhibition by acclaimed British artist David Hepher (b. 1935). Now in his 91st year with much of his practice dedicated to a sustained examination of London’s tower blocks, Brutalist architecture, and urban housing estates, in this exhibition Hepher surveys the Robin Hood Gardens in Poplar, East London. On his renowned large scale, and often working on concrete-primed surfaces layered with graffiti motifs, splatters of paint, and pictographic symbols and imagery, Hepher reflects on the legacy of this landmark estate.

For over six decades, British artist David Hepher has centred his work on the urban landscapes of south London. Exploring the scale and ‘austere grandeur’ of the expansive modern social housing estates built in the 1960s and 70s, Hepher was attracted to the formal beauty of their grid-like structures and by the physical and emotional traces of their many inhabitants. His multivalent work has both celebrated and mourned modernism in modes that are futuristic and nostalgic, utopian and entropic.

The exhibition runs from 15 October – 15 November 2025.

Sagarika Sundaram, Iris, 2023, Courtesy of Alison Jacques © Sagarika Sundaram

ALISON JACQUES (22 Cork Street) presents Alison Jacques presents ‘Release’, the first UK exhibition of new work by Sagarika Sundaram (b.1986, Kolkata, India; lives and works in New York). Working primarily with raw natural fibres, Sundaram’s intuitive practice of ‘painterly sculpture’ or ‘textile painting’ defies material, spatial, and linguistic boundaries. This new body of work deepens her connection to fibre and felt; nuanced in colour and complex in form, she sculpts space as well as material, incorporating felt reliefs and glass mosaics, as well as a large-scale installation. This exhibition anticipates Sundaram’s forthcoming solo show curated by Laurence Sillars at the Henry Moore Institute, Leeds, in 2026.

The exhibition runs from 15 October – 15 November 2025.

Marc Chagall’s La Jeune Mexicaine. Left: Cig Harvey’s Chive Blossoms, Images Courtesy of Alon Zakaim Fine Art

ALON ZAKAIM FINE ART (27 Cork Street) presents ‘Cig Harvey: I Want You To Remember This Forever’, the debut UK show of world-renowned photographer Cig Harvey at Alon Zakaim Fine Art, London. The exhibition is an enquiry into luminosity, pairing quintessential 19th and 20th century paintings and sculptures with the intimate photographic art of Cig Harvey, including works by Marc Chagall, Le Corbusier, and Chaïm Soutine. The exhibition is curated by Brandei Estes, former Head of Photographs at Sotheby’s.

The exhibition runs from 17 Oct – Fri 21 Nov 2025.

Zaam Arif, A Stranger, 2025 Vadehra Art Gallery, Image Courtesy of Vadehra Art Gallery and the artist

FRIEZE NO.9 CORK STREET (9 Cork Street) will present three exhibitions over the course of Frieze week.

Vadehra Art Gallery is pleased to present a solo exhibition by Houston based contemporary artist Zaam Arif at Frieze No.9 Cork Street from 10 October to 25 October 2025. Curated by London-based curator Ben Broome, the exhibition titled ‘Deewaar’ (translated from the Hindi as “the wall”), features 18 oil paintings across various scales, including portraiture, still life and surrealist interior scene.

As a young painter, Zaam Arif demonstrates a tremendous maturity in his philosophical reflections on the human experience, frequently returning to the principles of absurdity that shaped the thought of 20th-century philosopher Albert Camus. Camus’ ideas offer an affective respite for those grappling with a search for significance in an unrelenting, infinite world – an inquiry to which Arif responds through figurative compositions flowed together with both resolute presence and existential listlessness.

Curated by Slavs and Tatars & Asya Yaghmurian, Artwin Gallery presents an exhibition of works by eight artists, exploring notions of disdain and contempt, entitled ‘To everything, spurn, spurn, spurn’. Revisiting the famous 1965 song by The Byrds, Turn! Turn! Turn! (To Everything There Is a Season), these newly commissioned paintings, watercolours, and sculptures ask what it means to spurn or kick back, whether a lover or an epoch.

Hafez Gallery is proud to present a solo exhibition of renowned Egyptian painter Ibrahim El-Dessouki entitled ‘Testimony of the Soil’. The exhibition, curated by Dr Sara Raza, explores the complex relationship between the land, power, and labour through a series of new and recent allegorical paintings inspired by Egypt’s socio-political history, cinema, and literature.

The exhibitions run from 10 October – 25 October 2025.

El Anatsui, Untitled, 2025, Courtesy of Goodman Gallery and Jackson Pearce White

GOODMAN GALLERY (26 Cork Street) London and October Gallery are proud to present ‘El Anatsui | Go Back and Pick’, two concurrent exhibitions by El Anatsui, widely regarded as one of the most influential contemporary artists working today. Anatsui’s new wooden sculptures mark a significant moment in his artistic trajectory, evolving from his foundational use of the medium during the 1980s and 1990s. The two exhibitions of Anatsui’s most recent work underscore the artist’s presence in the much-anticipated Nigerian Modernism at Tate Modern, opening 8 October 2025.

The exhibitions run from 11 October – 19 November 2025.

Brandon Ndife, Brood of Vipers, 2024, Courtesy of the artist and Greene Naftali, New York. Photo: Júlia Standovár

HOLTERMANN FINE ART (30 Cork Street) are delighted to announce ‘Palimpsests’, the first international exhibition of works by New York artist Brandon Ndife, featuring sculptures and works on paper from the artist’s distinctive oeuvre. Brandon Ndife (b. 1991, Hammond, Indiana) lives and works in New York. His work is currently on view in A Garden of Promise and Dissent at the Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum, Ridgefield, Connecticut, and in Crosscurrents: Works from the Contemporary Collection at the Baltimore Museum of Art. A site-specific sculpture–commissioned by Lighthouse Works–is also on view at Fishers Island, New York.

The exhibition runs from 2 October 2025 – 29 November 2025.

Lenz Geerk, Untitled, 2025, Acrylic on canvas, 65 × 45 cm, Courtesy of the artist and MASSIMODECARLO

MASSIMODECARLO (16 Clifford Street) is pleased to present ‘November’, Lenz Geerk’s first solo exhibition with the gallery in London, marking his return to the city with a solo show after five years. Born in 1988 in Basel, Switzerland, and now living and working in Düsseldorf, Geerk paints scenes that feel like revelations – intimate moments that seem to float outside of time. The exhibition gathers three strands – haircuts, still lifes, and storefronts – into a single season, a climate of attention for small, ordinary acts. Geerk builds atmospheres out of grey-greens, mauves, rusts, and bruised pinks – tones that hover between shadow and afterglow.

The exhibition runs from 13 October – 15 November 2025.

Irvin Pascal, Eighty Two, 2019, Oil, linen cut-outs, hemp twine, banana leaf cut-outs, 42 × 208 cm, Courtesy of Messums London

MESSUMS LONDON (28 Cork Street) presents ‘The Ground Beneath: Material Memory and the Resilience of Hope’, an exhibition curated by Associate Director Lisa Anderson. The exhibition inaugurates Anderson’s curatorial vision at the gallery and marks a new direction for its emerging art programme – one shaped by material experimentation, cultural memory, and a globally attuned perspective.

The show builds on Messums’ commitment to socially engaged art, foregrounding work that addresses urgent cultural questions, challenges inequities, and fosters meaningful connections between artists, materials, and audiences. The Ground Beneath brings together a multidisciplinary group of mid-career and emerging artists working in sculpture, installation, painting, and performance. All of the exhibiting artists, which include Irvin Pascal, Justin Randolph Thompson, Sonia Elizabeth Barrett, Motunrayo Akinola, Camille Provost and Shirley Nette Williams, are of Black and African diasporic heritage. A shared thread is their use of materials that are ordinary in origin yet potent with potential the more so for being dismissed after initial use.

The exhibition runs from 8 October – 15 November 2025.

Pablo Picasso, Guitare sur une table, (recto); Le portail, Fontainebleau (verso),1921, Oil on canvas, 99 x 97.5 cm, Image Courtesy of Helly Nahmad Gallery

HELLY NAHMAD GALLERY (2 Cork Street) presents ‘Picasso/Pistoletto’. In this landmark exhibition, Michelangelo Pistoletto, a pioneer of Arte Povera and 2025 Nobel Peace Prize nominee, debuts fifteen new works from his iconic Mirror Paintings series in direct dialogue with Cubist masterpieces by Pablo Picasso. Bringing together these two titans of modern art for the first time, ‘Picasso/Pistoletto’ explores how their revolutionary practices redefined perspective and reshaped the course of visual culture.

The exhibition runs from 8 October – 12 December 2025.

Henry Moore, Seated Figure, 1949, Image Courtesy of Osborne Samuel

OSBORNE SAMUEL (21 Cork Street) are pleased to present ‘Modern British Art: Gentle Messiah Jim Ede’s Vision: In collaboration with Kettle’s Yard Cambridge’. Jim Ede, founder of Kettle’s Yard, significantly influenced the evolution and public appreciation of Modern British Art. A former curator at the Tate, Ede used his close relationships with artists and like-minded individuals to build a remarkable collection, which he famously shared by welcoming visitors into his home. This exhibition features loans from Kettle’s Yard alongside works from the gallery’s collection, reflecting the range of artists championed by Ede’s vision. Highlights include sculptures by Gaudier-Brzeska, Gabo, Moore, and Hepworth, and paintings by Ben and Winifred Nicholson, John Blackburn, Prunella Clough, Paul Feiler, Roger Hilton, John Piper, Alan Reynolds, Bridget Riley, William Scott, Alfred Wallis and Christopher Wood, among others.

The exhibition runs from 15 – 19 October 2025.

Martín del Cano, also known as the Master of Langa (doc. 1411-1421), The Entombment of Christ, Spain, Crown of Aragon, Daroca, c. 1420, Courtesy of Sam Fogg

SAM FOGG (15 Clifford Street) presents ‘Retablos II’, a new showcase of Spanish late-medieval retablos – monumental altarpieces unique to the Iberian Peninsula. Featuring eighteen panel paintings and five polychromed sculptures created between 1250 and 1520 in Castile and Aragon, the exhibition explores the dynamic artistic evolution of the period. From the decorative splendour of International Gothic to the emerging influence of Northern European styles, these richly detailed works reflect a moment of profound cultural exchange and innovation. Together, they offer a rare glimpse into the spiritual and artistic heart of medieval Spain.

The exhibition runs until 17 October 2025.

Alexandre Diop, A Vos marques ! Prêt ! Illegal, 2025, Courtesy of Stephen Friedman Gallery

STEPHEN FRIEDMAN GALLERY (25-28 Old Burlington Street) presents ‘Run For Your Life !’, a solo exhibition of new paintings by Franco-Senegalese artist Alexandre Diop. This marks the artist’s debut solo show at our London Gallery. Diop’s powerful mixed-media works delve into themes of history, metaphorical archaeology and socio-political change. Most importantly, it’s about the relationship between forms, lines and colours that allows him to create visual narratives. Drawing upon his experience as a dancer, musician and visual artist, Diop brings a multidisciplinary lens to his practice, crafting works that are deeply visceral and formally innovative.

The exhibition runs until 1 November 2025.

Ugonna Hosten, In the wake of our daughter’s becoming, 2023, Charcoal, graphite & soft pastel on paper, Courtesy of the artist and Tiwani Contemporary. Photo: Deniz Guzel

TIWANI CONTEMPORARY (24 Cork Street) presents two incredible debut presentations from Ugonna Hosten and Bunmi Agusto. Both artists centre drawing at the core of their multidisciplinary practices and are evolving episodic narratives featuring the psycho-spiritual encounters of a heroine in their own likeness on a pilgrimage of individuation and self-discovery.

In the upper and lower galleries, Ugonna Hosten (b.1982, Lagos, Nigeria) works across media that includes collage, assemblage and printmaking. She has been engaging a process that she describes as, “broadening and deepening a felt sense of the transpersonal dimension”, a spiritual awakening and foundation of a meditative practice that is taking her to new sites within, and uniting different fields of knowledge that includes philosophy, comparative mythologies, analytical psychology (specifically Carl Jung and Fanny Brewster) and Igbo spiritual traditions.

Tiwani Contemporary’s In Focus presentation in the viewing room is ‘Tales By Moonlight’, by world-builder, Bunmi Agusto (b.1999, Lagos, Nigeria). A mixed-media installation featuring moving-image, and a sumptuous suite of mid-scale compositions incorporating painting, drawing and printmaking, depicting, ‘Within’, Agusto’s interior fantasy world, and the domain of her alter-ego, Ó.

The exhibition runs from 2 October – 1 November 2025.

Barry Flanagan, Left and Right-Handed Nijinski on Anvil Point, 1999, Image courtesy of Waddington Custot

WADDINGTON CUSTOT (11-12 Cork Street) presents ‘Barry Flanagan: Two by Two’, an exhibition of bronze sculptures by one of Britain’s most distinctive and imaginative sculptors. Spanning works from 1983 to 2008, the show focuses on Flanagan’s playful and dynamic pairings of animal forms – most famously the hare – exploring themes of duality, performance and play. Marking 45 years since his first solo exhibition with the gallery, Two by Two brings together works that combine classical sculptural traditions with Flanagan’s idiosyncratic wit, anthropomorphic characters and deep engagement with myth, landscape and material.

The exhibition runs until 29 October 2025.