Coming to Tate Britain in July: a major Paula Rego retrospective

Since the 1950s, Paula Rego has played a key role in redefining figurative art in the UK and internationally. An uncompromising artist of extraordinary imaginative power, she has revolutionised the way in which women are represented.

This exhibition (7 July–24 October 2021) will tell the story of this artist’s extraordinary life, highlighting the personal nature of much of her work and the socio-political context in which it is rooted. It will also reveal the artist’s broad range of references, from comic strips to history painting.

It will feature over 100 works, including collage, paintings, large-scale pastels, ink and pencil drawings, etchings and sculpture. These will include early work from the 1950s in which Rego first explored personal as well as social struggle, her large pastels of single figures from the acclaimed Dog Women and Abortion series and her richly layered, staged scenes from the 2000-10s.

This will be a unique opportunity to survey, in the city that Rego has lived in and called home for most of her life, the full range of her work.

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Image: Paula Rego, The Dance 1988

Collection Tate

© Paula Rego