Frieze Masters: Stand E11, Regent's Park, London

In today’s tumultuous sociopolitical and economic climate negative contemporary attitudes towards freedom of movement and integration currently dominate accounts of migration. Yet, this perspective entirely overlooks the multifaceted histories of origins and outliers, cross-cultural exchange and intellectual migrations. The cultural landscape of Western Europe was reshaped from the start of the twentieth century due to the rich and innovative contributions of émigré artists of diverse nations, identities, and histories. Together, these men and women established cosmopolitan spheres of influence in their chosen towns and cities and consolidated new art movements through collaborative and community-driven groups, institutions, and support networks, which helped enrich and redefine understandings of European art in ways that continue to resonate today.

 

It is a commonplace to associate émigré status with those escaping from political and religious persecution or with the oppression and expulsion of dissidents; however, reasons for migration extend also to economic dislocation or new professional and creative opportunities, as well as seeking freedom from censorship. Such varied and nuanced conditions shaped the works of numerous émigré artists during the first half of the twentieth century. Marc Chagall, Jacques Lipchitz, and Lucie Rie, for instance, fled Fascist Europe as adults in the face of Jewish deportations, whilst Lucian Freud and Frank Auerbach escaped as children with their families. Pablo Picasso, Julio Gonzalez, and Alberto Giacometti, on the other hand, left the countries of their birth to seek new economic and professional opportunities, whilst Antoine Pevsner sought independence from the suppression of art under the communist regime. The non-European émigré artists Ronald Moody and Aubrey Williams will also feature in the exhibition, both of whom took up residence in Britain as members of the former British colonies of Jamaica and Guyana respectively. Artists such as these and the conditions under which they lived and worked continue to influence the collections of contemporary émigré artists, including Mona Hatoum and Edmund de Waal.

 

This exhibition will explore intergenerational dialogues but does so to assess the pioneering developments émigré artists helped to inspire on this continent and at an international level. A broad and innovative range of mediums and styles crossed international borders and flourished throughout these decades, emphasising the interplay between encounters and underscoring the inherent value of social and cultural diversity within the visual arts. As outliers in new cultures and societies, émigrés exist within the boundaries between transition and transformation. In consequence, a broad range of cultural traditions and identities migrate with them alongside memories and nostalgia, with these liminal spaces serving as sites of creative commemoration. These intellectual migrations offer the potential for émigrés’ works to share a freedom of artistic expression and dynamic experimentation often centred on what has been termed ‘the iconography of exile’. 

 

This exhibition will tell a complex but important story of migration to demonstrate the significant breadth of influence émigrés have had on our interwoven histories. The themes raised in this exhibition respond to larger current conversations surrounding not only global migration, displacement and trauma, but also identities, community, freedom, and integration. The subject matter in this exhibition is timely and coincides with multiple exhibitions seeking to explore the contributions of émigrés not only on the history of art in Britain but also within a global context. The Hepworth Wakefield, for example, assessed the creative outputs of Moody in Ronald Moody: Sculpting Life (June - November 2024), whilst Giacometti is currently the subject of an in-focus exhibition at Tate Modern’s Tanks. Interest in the sculptures of Giacometti continue with the Barbican’s current series of exhibitions in Encounters: Giacometti, which positions his figures in direct conversation with contemporary artists including Hatoum. Despite the often painful narratives informing émigré experiences centred on solitude and loss, histories of human migration have also been at the heart of momentous cultural change, namely in the cities of London and Paris. The present exhibition will celebrate the profound impact multiple generations of émigré artists have had on their adopted countries, and will showcase the transformative legacy they share in the development of Modernism.