Event type: Exhibition

Chris Shaw’s photographic series captures the battle between nature and the urban landscape in his hometown of Wallasey. The images show the resilience of plants as they break through tarmac and emerge from the water of the docks. Making the weed his subject, Shaw takes a traditionally unwanted and invasive species and shows the beauty in overlooked places.

Our display The Plant that Stowed Away takes its title from one of these photographs. The display looks to the series as a starting point to explore ideas of migration and the movement of people. Starting in Liverpool and its surroundings, we travel across time and geographies through works from the Tate Collection.

Join Dr Christine Eyene and Chris Shaw for an exciting discussion. They will discuss the agency of plants and the importance of maritime enterprise in Liverpool. Looking closely at Weeds of Wallasey, they will explore the importance of natural forms to the development of the city.

Biographies

Chris Shaw

Chris Shaw (born 1961) is a documentary photographer from Wallasey. He studied photography at art school then went on to document his experience working as a hotel night porter in London from 1993-2004.

His project Weeds of Wallasey began when he went to visit his ailing father. Having found his original plan of photographing his parent too emotionally difficult, Shaw instead turned the camera on the area where he grew up, searching for life and nature amongst the industrial backdrops.

Dr Christine Eyene

Dr Christine Eyene is an art historian, critic, and curator. She is Senior Lecturer in Contemporary Art at Liverpool John Moores University (LJMU) and Research Curator at Tate Liverpool. Her curatorial practice encompasses global contemporary arts, with a particular interest in African and Diaspora arts, feminism, photography, and sound art.

Since 2021, she has been developing research on the theme of ‘Botanical Histories and Colonial Legacies’, exploring the memory of the land in rural Cameroon, the movement of plants, traditional knowledge, and colonial histories. This research informed The Plant that Stowed Away at Tate Liverpool + RIBA North and the coinciding display What the Mountain Has Seen at LJMU.

Accessibility

Tate Liverpool is temporarily located at RIBA North, Mann Island, a short distance (425m) along Liverpool’s iconic waterfront. There is step free access to the main entrance. There is a lift to the first floor gallery, or alternatively you can take the stairs.

• Toilets are located on the first floor
• The nearest Changing Places toilet is located at the Museum of Liverpool
• Ear defenders are available to borrow. Please ask a Visitor Engagement Assistant

Additional seating is also available. Please ask a member of staff if you require assistance.

To help plan your visit to Tate Liverpool + RIBA North, have a look at our visual story. It includes photographs and information of what you can expect from a visit to the gallery.

For more information before your visit:

Email visiting.liverpool@tate.org.uk

Join us for a special day of art, music and performances with a chance to explore our display The Plant that Stowed Away. Get creative with a display-themed workshop and learn more about the movement of plants in Liverpool.

Accessibility

Tate Liverpool is temporarily located at RIBA North, Mann Island, a short distance (425m) along Liverpool’s iconic waterfront. There is step free access to the main entrance. There is a lift to the first floor gallery, or alternatively you can take the stairs.

• Toilets are located on the first floor
• The nearest Changing Places toilet is located at the Museum of Liverpool
• Ear defenders are available to borrow. Please ask a Visitor Engagement Assistant

Additional seating is also available. Please ask a member of staff if you require assistance.

To help plan your visit to Tate Liverpool + RIBA North, have a look at our visual story. It includes photographs and information of what you can expect from a visit to the gallery.

For more information before your visit:

Email visiting.liverpool@tate.org.uk

We Were There: How Black Culture, Resistance and Community Shaped Modern Britain by Lanre Bakare is about a Black Britain that for too long has been unknown and unexplored – the one that exists beyond London.

Lanre Bakare has a stellar reputation as a Guardian writer, covering the intersection of art, race and culture. Lanre believes that when people think about the recent history of Black Britain, they inevitably think of London. Having grown up in Bradford, Bakare wanted to write a corrective to that; this book is that corrective. He takes us on an epic journey across the UK, visiting Birmingham, Liverpool, Cardiff, Bradford, Wigan, Manchester and more.

Join us for an insightful event with Bakare and special guests, as he spotlights the extraordinary voices and stories of Black Britons and Black British culture.

We Were There: How Black Culture, Resistance and Community Shaped Modern Britain will be available to buy at this event.

Biography

Lanre Bakare was born in Bradford, West Yorkshire. He is a correspondent covering arts and culture for the Guardian, where his writing focuses on the intersection of art, race and culture across multiple disciplines. He was senior correspondent on the award-winning Cotton Capital project and has worked in New York and Los Angeles as part of the Pulitzer Prize-winning Guardian US team.

Accessibility

Tate Liverpool is temporarily located at RIBA North, Mann Island, a short distance (425m) along Liverpool’s iconic waterfront. There is step free access to the main entrance. There is a lift to the first floor gallery, or alternatively you can take the stairs.

• Toilets are located on the first floor
• The nearest Changing Places toilet is located at the Museum of Liverpool
• Ear defenders are available to borrow. Please ask a Visitor Engagement Assistant

Additional seating is also available. Please ask a member of staff if you require assistance.

To help plan your visit to Tate Liverpool + RIBA North, have a look at our visual story. It includes photographs and information of what you can expect from a visit to the gallery.

For more information before your visit:

Email visiting.liverpool@tate.org.uk

You’ll be buzzing with excitement with our bug-themed activities in our Learning Space this Easter holiday! From dragonflies to beetles, take inspiration from the creepy crawlies in Tate’s collection to construct multi-coloured neon replicas of your favourite bugs. Use the materials from our pick ‘n’ mix recycled craft box to make a 3D model of your bug.

On Saturday 5 April 13.00-15.00 there will also be a free workshop led by artist Colette Whittington. You’ll learn how to make relief stamps to print bug patterns and textures that can be used in your bug models.

Check out John Hoskin’s Black Beetle, Louise Bourgeois’ Spider, Mark Wallinger’s King Edward and the Colorado Beetle, Yinka Shonibare’s Grain Weevil and Andy Warhol’s Happy Butterfly Day for inspiration!

Our Learning Space is open every day for visiting families- a space to relax and create with art games, colouring-in, books, toys and more!

Share your experience with us on social media using @tateliverpool and #TLfamilies.

Accessibility

Tate Liverpool is temporarily located at RIBA North, Mann Island, a short distance (425m) along Liverpool’s iconic waterfront. There is step free access to the main entrance. There is a lift to the first floor gallery, or alternatively you can take the stairs.

• Toilets are located on the first floor
• The nearest Changing Places toilet is located at the Museum of Liverpool
• Ear defenders are available to borrow. Please ask a Visitor Engagement Assistant

Additional seating is also available. Please ask a member of staff if you require assistance.

To help plan your visit to Tate Liverpool + RIBA North, have a look at our visual story. It includes photographs and information of what you can expect from a visit to the gallery.

For more information before your visit:

Email visiting.liverpool@tate.org.uk

Tate Liverpool + RIBA North will be open late to celebrate the 13th edition of the Liverpool Biennial.

The 2025 Biennial is titled BEDROCK and is inspired by the physical and social foundations of Liverpool and the people, places and values that ground us.

Drop into our galleries to experience works from Tate’s collection including Christine Sun Kim, Sheila Hicks, Fred Wilson and Mounira Al Solh, alongside Cevdet Erek, Antonio Jose Guzman & Iva Jankovic and Hadassa Ngamba, making her debut in the UK.

Open Eye Gallery proudly presents No Iconic Images. Views of War, a thought-provoking exhibition examining contemporary depictions of war.

This exhibition invites audiences to reconsider the power of war photography in shaping collective memory, political narratives, and public perception. As images circulate faster than ever in a digital world, the exhibition raises pressing questions: Do we still need iconic images? How do they influence our understanding of war? And what happens when a single image defines an entire conflict?

In collaboration with The Guardian and Magnum Photos, the exhibition showcases projects by a new generation of Magnum photographers, Peter van Agtmael and Newsha Tavakolian, who offer personal insights into the wars they witnessed in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Syria.

The exhibition also delves into the editorial choices behind war photography today, with The Guardian providing a unique perspective on global conflicts, from Haiti to Myanmar. As Fiona Shields, The Guardian’s Head of Photography stated:”The geo-political nature of a conflict will often determine the priority of our reporting”, these images drives us to think about how photography shapes and influences our understanding of global crisis.

Investigative works by Forensic Architecture and the Centre for Spatial Technologies reconstruct the 2022 attack on Kyiv’s TV Tower, while artists Yarema Malashchuk and Roman Khimei challenge traditional Western aesthetics in representations of war casualties.“As the world burns and images circulate faster than ever, it examines recent wars and how they are portrayed and reflected upon through photography”. – Max Gorbatskyi and Viktoria Bavykina, exhibition curators.

Image: Raymond and his sons. Darien, Wisconsin, USA, 2007 © Peter van Agtmael / Magnum Photos

Across the country, art galleries and museums are celebrating the 250th birthday of one of Britain’s greatest painters, Joseph Mallord William Turner.

The Williamson holds a small but impressive collection of Turner watercolours, and will be bringing four onto public display. They show how he earned the moniker “Master Of Light”, and his mastery of watercolour as a medium.

These will be displayed in Gallery 4 as an intervention within Philip Wilson Steer: In Conversation. Turner was one of Steer’s idols, and this display is intended to encourage conversation and questioning around what it means to build on the style and ingenuity of Britain’s greatest landscape painter.

Subterranean Elevator has been conceived by artist Di Mainstone, and developed with a team of inter-disciplinary specialists. The installation invites intrepid visitors to explore the inner worlds of soil and the subconscious mind. On entering a dark, elevator-shaped environment, they will feel a soft earth-like substance beneath their feet, where they can stand, sit, or nestle.  As the elevator commences its ‘descent’, subterranean tourists will experience mesmerising sounds and projected visuals, creating the sensation of sinking deep into the earth.

Mainstone has coined the term “Subnosis” to describe this hypnotic journey, in which surreal subterranean creatures flourish amongst fleeting thoughts, tickled by roots and intersected by neural pathways that lead us into an interior universe. In this place of collective contemplation, we are invited to remember our connection to all living and nonliving things here on our precious planet.

The artwork aims to deepen our understanding of biodiversity loss and engage with the emotional landscape of the climate emergency.

How to Experience Subterranean Elevator

Please allow for your eye to adjust to a darker space when entering the space, moving slowly and with caution.

Shoes are to be removed before entering the sand box.

If you are entering the sand box, please use the spaces below the benches to store belongings.

There are steps at the side of the sand box to enter and exit.

Children must be supervised at all times in the space and sandbox.

Do not throw sand.

Digging into the land and lineage of historical sites for the past five years, collaborative artist duo, Angela Stringer and Nicky Perrin present their formative works in an exhibition which reveals the alchemical process of turning raw earth into vibrant expressions of story and place.

Harnessing natural materials such as sandstone, soil, clay and botanical matter from their local Wirral environment and beyond, they create paint and dyes to make work which transcends its origins, merging contemporary techniques with ancient traditions.

A reconstruction of the artists’ apothecary style studio will immerse visitors in their creative practice, showcasing the tools used to hand-process rock into fine pigment, before the time-honoured method of mulling it into paint.

Un/Earthed is the materialisation of journeying between the coasts of Anglesey and woodlands of Wirral. It is an exploration of identity, heritage and tales told through natural colour, reflecting on the deep connection between people and place.

EVENTS:

Film Screening: The Nettle Dress

Friday 23rd May, 6pm, £7

 

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