Tate has announced its 2027 programme, and the headline is Hockney at 90. Tate is marking it twice: a multimedia installation in the Turbine Hall in the summer, and a career-spanning show at Tate Britain in the autumn. Two institutions, one artist, one extraordinary number. It’s the kind of anniversary that justifies the scale.
The rest of the programme is substantial. Gainsborough, Monet and Munch will each get dedicated shows — the kind of historic survey exhibitions that Tate does with more resources and more access to loans than almost anyone else. On the contemporary side, Sonia Boyce, Lynda Benglis and Chila Kumari Singh Burman. Group exhibitions will look at artistic life under the Tudors and the history of ink painting in Asia, which, on paper, sounds like an unlikely pairing but probably reflects something deliberate about how the programme has been shaped this year.
The Turner Prize heads to the West Country for the first time, which is worth noting — taking the prize outside London and the usual circuit matters, even if the art world’s attention tends to follow it reluctantly.
David Hockney Tate 2027 lineup
There’s a transition happening at the top. Maria Balshaw leaves this month after nine years, and Karin Hindsbo steps in as Interim Director while the search for a permanent appointment continues. Hindsbo, announcing the programme, described it as one “that only Tate could deliver” — spanning five centuries and multiple continents. That’s the kind of claim that’s easy to make and harder to sustain, but looking at what’s actually been announced, it’s not an unreasonable one.
Tate Members can enjoy unlimited free entry to all these exhibitions, with no need to book. Membership starts at only £7.50 a month and includes access to Members’ Rooms, exclusive events, Tate Etc. magazine, and discounts at Tate’s shops.
All 16-25-year-olds can join Tate Collective for free, which gives them £5 exhibition tickets for themselves and up to three friends. With over 190,000 members, Tate Collective is the world’s largest arts membership scheme for young people.
Monet Tate 2027 line-up
TATE MODERN
Monet: Painting Time will be Tate Modern’s first exhibition devoted to Claude Monet, bringing together many breathtaking paintings and rarely seen works. Drawing on new research, the show will centre on the artist’s relationship with time at the dawn of the industrial age. Visitors will see how Monet captured fleeting, instantaneous moments and the passing of years and seasons, as epitomised by his iconic Water Lilies cycle.
Ink will be Tate’s first-ever exhibition dedicated to the enduring and profoundly philosophical practice of ink painting. The show will focus on 20th-century artists in mainland China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan who reinvented this beautiful, intricate art form as a modern painting. It will also highlight key ideas within the ink tradition, including its historical continuity and relationship to the natural world.
David Hockney will present a multimedia installation in the Turbine Hall to coincide with his 90th birthday. A passionate opera fan, Hockney has created many celebrated designs for sets and costumes since the 1970s. These will be brought to life and projected onto vast screens in Tate Modern’s most iconic space, offering visitors a thrilling experience of music and art in motion.
Baya was a groundbreaking Algerian artist whose geometric patterns and bold colours were rooted in the natural surroundings of her homeland. Her work influenced generations of artists and thinkers, including Pablo Picasso and André Breton. Tate Modern will present the UK’s first ever solo exhibition of Baya’s work, featuring more than 100 of her vivid gouache watercolours.
Nalini Malani’s incredible six-decade career will be celebrated with her largest exhibition to date. Known in India since the 1960s for her pioneering multidisciplinary approach, Malani has gained global recognition for her monumental multimedia installations. Evoking both beauty and discomfort, her work rewrites Western and Eastern history, myths and literature, inviting viewers to question the world around them.
Lynda Benglis is renowned for challenging conventions and reinventing materials. This approach can be seen in her celebrated ‘pours’, for which she mixed materials such as latex and Day-Glo pigment and poured them onto the floor to dramatic effect. Tate Modern will present more than 50 extraordinary works, showcasing the inventive aesthetic that has cemented Benglis’s role as one of the most influential artists of our time.
Tate has announced its 2027 programme, Edvard Munch
Edvard Munch described his paintings as ‘impressions from the life of the soul’, creating powerful, cinematic images which expressed feelings we all recognise – love, loss and loneliness. Tate Modern’s compelling new exhibition will look at Munch’s paintings through the lens of cinema and visual storytelling. With unique input from filmmakers, it will shine a new light on his radical tales of identity and desire.
Each season will also be marked by one of Tate Modern’s three annual commissions: the cutting-edge Infinities Commission in the Tanks, the participatory summer commission for UNIQLO Tate Play, and the world-renowned Hyundai Commission in the Turbine Hall in the autumn. Tate Modern’s free collection displays will also continue to be refreshed throughout the year, including an ARTIST ROOMS exhibition of Robert Rauschenberg’s trailblazing art, and a group show focusing on Lebanon in the pivotal year of 1990.
Sonia Boyce Tate 2027 line-up
TATE BRITAIN
Sonia Boyce’s 40-year career will be presented in a major exhibition of large-scale installations, photography, collage, drawing, film and sculpture. This multi-sensory show will celebrate a practice shaped by her fierce experimentation and a refusal to conform. It will trace Boyce’s collaborative and improvisational techniques, navigating questions of collective memory and the boundaries between private and public experiences.
Gainsborough will be the subject of a landmark exhibition marking the 300th anniversary of the artist’s birth. The show will bring together 120 works in a once-in-a-generation tribute to this quintessentially Georgian artist. Reflecting the wide variety of his practice, it will explore the contrast between the glamorous society portraits that made his name and the creative chaos in which he worked behind the scenes
David Hockney’s 90th birthday will be celebrated with a large-scale exhibition at Tate Britain. The show will focus on the role that family, friends and lovers have played in Hockney’s visual storytelling, and how intimacy and human connection inform his art. Featuring over 200 works, it will span the full breadth of his seven-decade career, from trailblazing 1960s explorations of queer love and desire to tender depictions of his parents, and recent works that explore private moments in his home and studio.
The Tudors reigned over a period that saw the birth of modern Britain and, in turn, of British painting. Tate’s first major presentation of Tudor art in 30 years will bring a fresh perspective to this profoundly transformative period. Over 150 exceptional oil paintings, miniatures, works on paper, sculptures and decorative art objects will be brought together, including iconic portraits of Henry VIII and Elizabeth I.
Throughout the year, Tate Britain’s Art Now programme of free exhibitions will continue to showcase emerging artistic talent, and the Duveen Galleries at the heart of the building will present a large-scale free display of contemporary sculptures and installations from Tate’s collection.
TATE LIVERPOOL
The transformation of Tate Liverpool, the UK’s most popular museum of modern and contemporary art outside London, will be completed in 2027. This iconic building is being reimagined for the 21st century to display the breadth of Tate’s collection and world-class exhibitions. A new art hall will showcase large-scale installations, while new spaces for play, relaxation and learning will offer spectacular views across the Mersey.
Chila Kumari Singh Burman will reopen the gallery with a career-spanning solo exhibition. One of the UK’s most dynamic artists, Chila is unapologetically bold, with a practice that addresses self-representation, feminism and her Hindu Punjabi heritage. Her iconography is steeped in contemporary culture.
The full programme of exhibitions, commissions and displays for Tate Liverpool’s reopening will be announced in due course.
TATE ST IVES
Gulnur Mukazhanova is renowned for her expressive use of felt in wall-based works and large-scale installations. Tate St Ives will stage her first UK museum survey, bringing together existing works alongside a site-responsive work created for the exhibition. Influenced by Kazakh textile traditions rooted in nomadic cultures, Mukazhanova addresses the friction between a rapidly globalising world and enduring traditions.
The Turner Prize, one of the world’s best-known visual art awards, will travel to the Southwest of England for the very first time next year. Visitors to St Ives will experience the work of some of the most exciting contemporary artists in Britain today. The 2027 shortlist will be announced in the spring ahead of an exhibition of their work opening in the autumn, with the winner announced in December.
EXHIBITIONS
Monet: Painting Time (25 February – 27 June 2027, Tate Modern, organised by Tate Modern and Musée de l’Orangerie.
Sonia Boyce (24th March – 22nd August 2027, Tate Britain)
Ink (22 April – 30 August 2027, Tate Modern), presented in the Eyal Ofer Galleries. Research supported by Hyundai Tate Research Centre: Transnational
Gulnur Mukazhanova (May – September 2027, Tate St Ives)
Thomas Gainsborough (20 May – 10 October 2027, Tate Britain), research supported by the Manton Historic British Art Scholarship Fund
Infinities Commission (Summer 2027, Tate Modern), supported by The Glass Castle Foundation
David Hockney (Summer 2027, Tate Modern)
Baya (10 June – 17 October 2027, Tate Modern), supported by Art Mentor Foundation Lucerne.
Nalini Malani (1 July 2027 – 3 January 2028, Tate Modern)
Lynda Benglis (30 September 2027 – 5 March 2028, Tate Modern), organised by the Kunstmuseum Basel, in collaboration with Tate Modern and the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art
David Hockney (7 October 2027 – 20 February 2028, Tate Britain)
Turbine Hall/ Hyundai Commission (Opening October 2027, Tate Modern) in partnership with Hyundai Motor
Turner Prize (21 October 2027 – 23 January 2028, Tate St Ives)
Edvard Munch (11 November 2027 – 23 April 2028, Tate Modern), organised by Tate Modern in collaboration with MUNCH
The Tudors (18 November 2027 – 23 April 2028) Research supported by the Manton Historic British Art Scholarship Fund
Chila Kumari Singh Burman (Opening 2027, Tate Liverpool), supported by the Bagri Foundation, with additional support from the E. Rhodes and Leona B. Carpenter Foundation, the Chila Kumari Singh Burman Supporters Circle, Tate?Patrons, Tate Members and Tate Americas Foundation
UNIQLO Tate Play (Throughout the year, Tate Modern)
Art Now (Throughout the year, Tate Britain, supported by The Bukhman Foundation.
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