5 amazing art shows to see this July

Seeking inspiration for exhibitions to visit this month? These are top of our list

Model Sally Pritchett wearing an antique kimono at V&A Dundee. Photo: Laura Prieto Martin; styling: Mamiko Sato

1. A fashion icon

It’s V&A Dundee’s turn to host the dazzling Kimono: Kyoto to Catwalk. The exhibition explores the style and influence of the kimono from 17th-century Japan to the global couture and street fashion of today. The garment’s form has remained largely unchanged in centuries yet evolves with each generation. It’s catnip to designers, with figures like Issey Miyake and Alexander McQueen, rock stars, and costumiers for films such as Star Wars adopting it for their own. See some outstanding examples in this silky staging of the show.

Until 5 January 2025; vam.ac.uk/dundee

Claudette Johnson’s Yellow Vest, 2023. Image: © Claudette Johnson, courtesy the artist and Hollybush Gardens, London

2. Johnson’s people

Claudette Johnson’s majestic figurative works are truly large-scale yet have an unnerving intimacy to them. They draw you in. You wonder about the stories of her subjects, who are predominantly Black women (though recently men figure too). Johnson (b.1959) was a founding member of the Black British Arts Movement, also known as the BLK Art Group, formed in the early 1980s. She’s a key figure, along with artists such as Lubaina Himid and Sonia Boyce, on our arts landscape. Her work has been celebrated in recent times with important showings, including a retrospective at London’s Courtauld earlier this year. Now comes this beautiful exhibition, Claudette Johnson: Darker Than Blue, displaying recent and new works. It’s staged at The Barber Institute of Fine Arts at the University of Birmingham.

Until 15 September; barber.org.uk

Pablo Picasso working in his sculpture studio at Le Fournas, Valluris, France, 1953. Image: artwork © Succession Picasso/DACS, London 2024. Photo: Edward Quinn © edwardquinn.com

3. Pioneering form

The Gagosian in Grosvenor Hill in London is exploring the sculptural work of three standout names in art history this month. The Body as Matter: Giacometti Nauman Picasso is the first exhibition to show sculptural work by the three artists together. It offers a rare chance to see key pieces, including Picasso’s La femme enceinte I (1950), Alberto Giacometti’s La jambe (1958) and Bruce Nauman’s Model for Room with My Soul Left Out, Room That Does Not Care (1984). Compare and contrast the approaches these three pioneers, each a defining figure of their time, have made towards the medium in this electrifying show.

Until 26 July; gagosian.com

Cedric Morris’s Still Life, Nasturtiums and Pears, 1952. Image: Philip Mould & Company, London

4. Suffolk lens

The artists Sir Cedric Morris (1889–1982) and Arthur Lett-Haines (1894–1978) had a long association with the county of Suffolk. From the 1940s they lived in an ancient house in the market town of Hadleigh; from there they staged fantastic parties and founded the East Anglian School of Painting and Drawing. Among their pupils were a young Lucian Freud and Maggi Hambling. It’s fitting, then, that a new exhibition featuring Morris and Lett-Haines is being staged in the county, at Gainsborough’s House in Sudbury. Revealing Nature: The Art of Cedric Morris and Lett-Haines will explore the work of this colourful duo and include rarely exhibited pieces from private collections.

6 July–3 November; gainsborough.org

Noémie Goudal’s Prendre le soleil, installation view, Hangar Y, Meudon, France. Image: © Noémie Goudal. Courtesy of Hangar Y. Photo by Aurélien Mole

5. Goudal’s world

Look out for the name Noémie Goudal. The Paris-based artist is something of an illusionist. She has staged illusory installations in the landscape and is known for how she explores the ways ecology and anthropology intersect. Her inkjet prints of landscape imagery are beautiful; her installation work is enquiring, curious and often super-sized. Her work comes laden with literary references. This month the artist has a major solo exhibition opening at Mostyn in Llandudno. Entitled Contours of Certainty, the artist, says the gallery, will be ‘transforming the spaces into metaphysical realms’.

13 July–7 September; mostyn.org

For more inspiring shows see The Arts Society Magazine, available exclusively to members and supporters of The Arts Society (to join see theartssociety.org/member-benefits)