Queens and cakes: Top 8 Museum Exhibitions opening in London in September and October 2025
From Picasso to Marie Antoinette – this autumn, the British capital impresses with its list of celebrity art shows and some quirkier ones, too.
Georges Seurat (1859 - 1891), The Channel of Gravelines, an Evening, 1890, Oil on canvas, 65.4 x 81.9 cm, The Museum of Modern Art, New York, Gift of Mr. and Mrs. William A. M. Burden 785.1963, © Digital image, The Museum of Modern Art, New York/Scala, Florence
Autumn brings shorter days and windier weather – a perfect time to rediscover London’s joyous roster of world-famous museums. Their free permanent collections are more than enough entertainment in themselves, but this season brings fresh excitement. If you are looking for something a little different – items previously unseen in the UK, perhaps, or a new take on a familiar subject – there’s plenty to be found in this delicious crop.
Henry van de Velde (1863-1957), Twilight, about 1889, Oil on canvas, 45.2 x 60 cm, Collection Kröller-Müller Museum, Otterlo, the Netherlands (KM 106.502), © DACS 2025 / Collection Kröller-Müller Museum, Otterlo, the Netherlands. Photographer: Rik Klein Gotink
Radical Harmony: Helene Kröller-Müller’s Neo-Impressionists
The National Gallery
Open until 8 February 2026
How radical could art be? See for yourself what some late-19th century critics were calling the death of painting. Widely known as the Pointillists, these artists painted using a multitude of dots, creating illusions of light. Along with stirring up controversy in artistic circles, they supported anarchism and depicted societal struggles in some works. The majority of these paintings, though, are depictions of beautiful people and spacious landscapes. The exhibition also shines a light on one of the first women art patrons of the 20th century and how she built the most comprehensive collection of Neo-Impressionism in the world, including major works by Seurat.
Kerry James Marshall, School of Beauty, School of Culture, 2012. Acrylic and glitter on unstretched canvas, 274.3 x 401.3 cm. Collection of the Birmingham Museum of Art, Alabama; Museum purchase with funds provided by Elizabeth (Bibby) Smith, the Collectors Circle for Contemporary Art, Jane Comer, the Sankofa Society, and general acquisition funds, 2012.57. © Kerry James Marshall. Courtesy of the artist and Jack Shainman Gallery, New York. Photo: Sean Pathasema
Kerry James Marshall: The Histories
Royal Academy
20 September 2025 - 18 January 2026
Why would anyone continue to paint now? This American artist takes the ‘high-art’ form to new heights – bringing together art history, civil rights, comics and science fiction, among other references. The bright, crisp paintings are Marshall’s way of placing everyday moments in Black Americans’ lives on the same level as history paintings of the past. He is asking: who decides what is visible and important? Those same people decide the future, so he makes sure it is an optimistic one.
Soutaja, 1981, Lea Ignatius, Reproduced by permission of the artist's estate © The Trustees of the British Museum, Colour etching
Nordic Noir: works on paper from Edvard Munch to Mamma Andersson
The British Museum
9 October 2025 – 22 March 2026
If you love the edgy gloom of Nordic TV series, this exhibition is for you. From the painter of The Scream, to Olafur Eliasson, who brought sun (and later glacier ice) to Tate Modern, these Nordic artists went back to plain paper to depict their most melancholy and provocative thoughts. Featuring over 100 artists, this exhibition is a sweep of the last 100 years of war, political issues and human rights, but also myths, nature and global warming. Creatively inventive, these works of art may be quiet in scale, but not in their emotional or political depths.
Pablo Picasso, The Acrobat, 1930. Paris, Musée National Picasso-Paris. © RMN-Grand Palais (Musée national Picasso-Paris) / Adrien Didierjean © Succession Picasso/DACS, London 2025.
Tate Modern
17 September 2025 – 12 April 2026
Who was Picasso, really? One of the most famous artists ever, his life and persona were all part of his artistic act. This exhibition provides a theatrical set (backstage and all) for Tate’s Picassos and then several more from Europe, some never seen in London previously. Picasso created a myth of an outsider genius and then performed it himself. He was also interested in the world of theatre and performers, bringing this fascination to his canvases – one of the most celebrated being The Three Dancers, a Tate masterpiece, painted a hundred years ago. Its centenary is the pretext of this show, which attempts to raise a curtain on this very real and yet very contrived artist.
Lee Miller, Model Elizabeth Cowell, part of the Lee Miller exhibition at Tate Britain.
Tate Britain
2 October 2025 – 15 February 2026
Fashion, war, and Egyptian landscapes – the surrealist photographer Lee Miller had her lens pointed in all the right directions. Previously a model (and recently portrayed by Kate Winslet in the BAFTA-nominated film ‘Lee’), her career did not take familiar paths. A leading figure in the avant-garde scenes of New York, Paris, London and Cairo from the 1920s to 1940s, she made a record of the time that was extraordinary. This show brings together 250 prints, some never before displayed, to celebrate this fearless artist and offer us a glimpse of the fascinating time in which she lived.
Installation image, Marie Antoinette Style, Victoria and Albert Museum.
Victoria & Albert Museum, South Kensington
20 September 2025 – 22 March 2026
If OTT was a person, it would have been Marie Antoinette. Glamorous, tragic, controversial – she was all of these, and more. Her story continues to fascinate; her fashion continues to influence. This show explores both the origins and the continuous and countless revivals of her style. Design, film, decorative arts – she serves as inspiration to a range of creatives from Dior to Vivienne Westwood. The exhibition includes personal items, such as her silk slippers, alongside contemporary couture pieces from design houses such as Chanel and Valentino, and costumes from Sophia Coppola’s Oscar-winning film starring Kirsten Dunst. Whether you like history, fashion or film, this is one to book now.
Wayne Thiebaud (1920 - 2021), Cakes, 1963, oil on canvas, National Gallery of Art, Washington, copyright Wayne Thiebaud/VAGA at ARS, NY and Dacs, London 2025.
Wayne Thiebaud. American Still Life
The Courtauld
10 October 2025 – 18 January 2026
Thiebaud’s anti-glamour art will transport you into the everyday world of 1960s America through food. Hot dogs, lemon meringue pies, gumball dispensers – his vibrant still-lifes are unique. Nothing was too insignificant, or too mundane; if you could find it at a diner or on a deli counter, you could find it in his paintings. Food has often served as an inspiration and metaphor in experienced artists’ hands – think Dutch 17th century lemons, or Cézanne’s apples. Thiebaud continues this centuries-old tradition by showing that even the humble cream cake has its place in the history of art.
Audrey Hepburn in costume for My Fair Lady, 1963. Original colour transparency. The Cecil Beaton Archive, London.
Cecil Beaton’s Fashionable World
National Portrait Gallery
9 October 2025 – 11 January 2026
Whether Elizabeth Taylor or Queen Elizabeth II, Cecil Beaton’s subjects were powerful or glamorous, or both. He himself was many things – illustrator, costume designer, caricaturist, writer – but remains best known for making art out of fashion photography. This show features his famous photographs, but will go beyond that to include letters, portrait sketches, fashion illustration and costume. From Oscar-winning success with My Fair Lady to iconic photographs of Marilyn Monroe and Audrey Hepburn, this artist left a trail of beauty and style on everything he touched.