Waterside Contemporary
Defunct art gallery in London, England
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Waterside Contemporary was a visual art gallery in Hackney, central-east London. The gallery's programme focused on politically- and socially-engaged artists,[1][2][3] including Oreet Ashery, George Barber, Mirza and Butler, Nikita Kadan, and Chiara Fumai. The gallery exhibition programme involved over a hundred artists like Libia Castro & Ólafur Ólafsson, Mathilde ter Heijne, Slavs and Tatars in nearly thirty exhibitions, performances, public events,[4] publishing, and institutional collaborations.[5]
Waterside Contemporary was founded in 2008 by Pierre d'Alancaisez[6] as the Waterside Project Space, named after the Waterside building on Wharf Road in which it was located. Initially an artist-run not-for-profit, the gallery became commercially active in 2010 with a presentation at ViennaFair.[7] Olga Ovenden became co-director with the gallery's move to nearby Hoxton.[8][9] The gallery stopped exhibiting operations under the Waterside name in 2017.
Waterside Contemporary commissioned, curated and premiered landmark works such as Animal with a Language by Oreet Ashery,[10] The Unreliable Narrator by Karen Mirza and Brad Butler,[11] and The Freestone Drone by George Barber.[12][13]
In 2024, the team behind Waterside Contemporary launched Verdurin, a cultural project space in the former gallery's premises.[14]
Notable exhibitions
2013
- Long ago, and not true anyway, a group exhibition with Joana Hadjithomas and Khalil Joreige, Rabih Mroué, et al.[15][16]
- Reconstitution, an event at Soho House accompanying the exhibition[17]
2014
- Animal with a Language, a solo exhibition by Oreet Ashery[18]
- The Unreliable Narrator, a solo exhibition by Karen Mirza and Brad Butler[19]
- The Freestone Drone, a solo exhibition by George Barber[20][21]
2015
- Nascent States, a group exhibition with Olivia Plender, Mathilde ter Heijne, Chiara Fumai, Anetta Mona Chişa & Lucia Tkáčova, Pauline Boudry / Renate Lorenz, Judith Barry, et al.[22][23]
- Limits of Responsibility, a solo exhibition by Nikita Kadan[24][25][26][27]
