Whitechapel Art Gallery

Located in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets the ‘Whitechapel’ (originally called the East End Gallery) was built during the period 1897-99 and designed in an Arts and Crafts style by Charles Harrison Townsend. Opened in 1901 the now legendary Whitechapel Boys met there in the early years of the 20th Century. Its many other claims to fame are its early exhibitions of the works of Frida Kahlo, Jackson Pollock, Mark Rothko and Picasso whose ‘Guernica’ was displayed in 1939 on its only visit to the British Isles. Some of Britain’s most important contemporary artists have held solo exhibitions at the Gallery. These include Peter Doig, Ian McKeever, Lucian Freud and local residents Gilbert & George. In 1970 David Hockney held his first retrospective show at the Whitechapel and the seminal 1956 Pop Art exhibition ‘This is Tomorrow’ was also staged there.

The Millennium saw an ambitious £10.5 million expansion programme completed in 2009. Throughout its history, the Whitechapel Art Gallery has held a series of open exhibitions that were a strong feature for the area's artist community and promoted artists who lived and worked in the East End of London. Sadly however by the 1990's the 'Open' became less relevant as emerging artists moved to other areas. In over a century of existence, there have been only six gallery Directors. These include such artistic icons as Bryan Robertson (1952–1968) and Nicholas Serota (1976–1988) who went on to become the Director of the Tate Gallery.

Whitechapel Open
There were annual exhibitions of local artists work at the Whitechapel Art Gallery from 1910, which in 1932 became the East End Academy open to all artists living or working east of Aldgate Pump. After 1969 it was designated the East London Open and in 1977 it was renamed 'The Whitechapel Open and the catchment area re-defined to include the Docklands and the City.