Serpentine Galleries

Serpentine Galleries Art and ideas for a changing world. The Serpentine is one of London’s best-loved galleries for modern and contemporary art. Guide dogs are permitted.
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They attract up to 800,000 visitors in any one year and admission is free. In the grounds of the Galleries is a permanent work by artist and poet Ian Hamilton Finlay, dedicated to the Serpentine’s former Patron Diana, Princess of Wales. The work comprises eight benches, a tree-plaque, and a carved stone circle at the Gallery’s entrance. In September 2013, Serpentine Galleries opened its new space, the Serpentine North Gallery. This innovative arts venue for the 21st century is housed in the Grade II-listed building formerly known as The Magazine, situated in Kensington Gardens. In 2016 the Serpentine Pavilion programme expanded to include four Summer Houses in a group show of architecture in the built form. The Serpentine, in association with Bloomberg Philanthropies, has also opened the Build Your Own Pavilion Challenge, a competition for 8-14 year olds to design and enter their Pavilion models. For more information http://buildyourownpavilion.serpentinegalleries.org/

Getting here

Serpentine South Gallery
Nearest tube stations: Lancaster Gate, Knightsbridge or South Kensington Main bus routes: 9, 10, 52, 94, 148

Serpentine North Gallery
Nearest tube stations: Lancaster Gate or Marble Arch Main bus routes: 148, 274, 390 94

Group visits
The Serpentine welcomes school, university and community groups to the Galleries on Tuesday through Sunday for self-led visits. All groups must book in advance with the visitor experience team. For further information regarding planning a group visit, please visit our group visits page. Parking for vehicles and bicycles
There is metered car parking in Kensington Gardens and Hyde Park. There is dedicated cycle parking within the grounds of the Serpentine North Gallery. There are Santander Cycles hire stations on West Carriage Drive near the Serpentine North Gallery and on The Ring near the Serpentine South Gallery. Dogs
Dogs are not permitted inside the Serpentine Galleries or The Magazine restaurant. There are several dog rings and a water bowl outside the Serpentine South Gallery for short visits. Accessibility
We have full disability access and facilities. Facilities – toilets/baby changing room
The Serpentine Galleries have full disability access and facilities. There is a baby changing room located at each Gallery. Refreshments
Benugo runs a cafe at the Serpentine Pavilion. There is a selection of teas, coffees, sandwiches and cakes available daily 10am-6pm from June until October. The Magazine restaurant at the Serpentine North Gallery offers visitors a selection of snack items, teas, coffees, cocktails and wine. Opening times vary on a daily basis. For more information visit: https://www.benugo.com/restaurants/magazine

LANZA’s first monograph brings together new contributions from the fields of architecture and literature to reflect on t...
08/10/2026

LANZA’s first monograph brings together new contributions from the fields of architecture and literature to reflect on their Serpentine Pavilion and wider practice.

It includes contributions by the co-founders of LANZA atelier: an essay and hand-drawings that highlight the Pavilion’s concept and design.

The catalogue also features texts by curator José Esparza Chong Cuy (José Esparza Chong Cuy) and Pulitzer Prize-winning author Cristina Rivera Garza; a poem by ocean vuong; photos by Iwan Baan; and an in-depth interview with Artistic Director Hans Ulrich Obrist.

Available to shop online and on-site.

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Co-published with BuchhandlungWaltherFranzKönig
Design by Estudio Herrera
Edited by Tamsin Hong and Liz Stumpf (Liz Stumpf)

Images: Graham Pearson

Now open: ‘Change Ringing’ by Justin Caguiat.Working directly with Serpentine South’s architecture and infrastructure, t...
08/10/2026

Now open: ‘Change Ringing’ by Justin Caguiat.

Working directly with Serpentine South’s architecture and infrastructure, this exhibition considers how buildings accumulate memory, ritual and acts of transformation.

Caguiat presents a wide range of works, including a new series of thermochromic paintings that continually transform due to their layers of heat-sensitive pigment that reveal different forms as temperatures fluctuate.

A series of bronze bells cast in the shapes of various flowers and plant seeds ring throughout the galleries. The score, composed by Lily Pickett, draws on the principles of English ‘change ringing’, in which bells play mechanically in a continuous loop as pistons fire in sequential code. The walls gather and amplify the bells’ chimes, transforming the space into a listening instrument.

Serpentine South
8 October 2026 – 10 January 2027
Free admission

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‘Change Ringing’ is presented with major support from Bukhman Foundation and Fundación Sandretto Re Rebaudengo Madrid.

Images: Justin Caguiat: ‘Change Ringing’, installation view, Serpentine South, 2026. Photos: George Darrell

02/10/2026

‘Change Ringing’ by Justin Caguiat opens Thursday at Serpentine South. Tickets are free and available to book online.

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Video:

A series of letters lines the walls of Amar Kanwar’s exhibition.Comprising video, light projections and text, they are a...
27/09/2026

A series of letters lines the walls of Amar Kanwar’s exhibition.

Comprising video, light projections and text, they are an extension of the artist’s film ‘Such a Morning’, in which a professor writes letters to the outside world after spending many months in darkness.

Seven letters unfold across 62 sheets of banana, ramie and cotton-fibre paper, handmade by Sherna Dastur, a longtime collaborator of Kanwar’s.

Discover the letters at Serpentine North until 31 January 2027. Admission is free.

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Images: ‘Amar Kanwar’, installation view, Serpentine North, 2026. © Amar Kanwar. Video: Marco Da Re and Luca Giraudo. Photos: © Luke Walker

Now open: ‘Amar Kanwar’For over twenty years, artist Amar Kanwar has created lyrical films that move between documentary...
23/09/2026

Now open: ‘Amar Kanwar’

For over twenty years, artist Amar Kanwar has created lyrical films that move between documentary, travelogue and visual essay to explore the conditions of the Indian subcontinent.

Whilst charged with a regional specificity and deeply personal histories, Kanwar’s work grapples with some of the most pressing issues of our time, including social upheaval, displacement and the impulse towards violence.

By reckoning with the past to better comprehend the present, he ultimately reveals what unites us, regardless of geography or context.

In the exhibition’s darkened gallery spaces, you’ll encounter the feature-length film ‘Such a Morning’ (2017), the multi-screen installation ‘The Peacock’s Graveyard’ (2023) and the premiere of a multi-screen installation titled ‘The Charcoal Man’ (2026).

You might choose to spend a whole morning or afternoon in the exhibition, as the total running time is approximately 3 hours. Alternatively, you are welcome to visit the exhibition for as long as you wish and move between the works at your own pace – return whenever you like to explore more.

23 September 2026 – 31 January 2027
Serpentine North
Free entry

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Amar Kanwar’s exhibition is made possible by SP Lohia Foundation and The Rosenkranz Foundation.

Images: Amar Kanwar, installation view, Serpentine North, 2026. © Amar Kanwar. Photo: © Luke Walker

Serpentine Pavilion 2026: ‘a serpentine’ by LANZA. There’s just over one month left to see the commission. Visit for fre...
20/09/2026

Serpentine Pavilion 2026: ‘a serpentine’ by LANZA.

There’s just over one month left to see the commission. Visit for free until 25 October 2026.

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Photos: Iwan Baan

17/09/2026

Artistic Director recounts a conversation he had with a taxi driver outside the Serpentine Pavilion.

The Serpentine Pavilion 2026, ‘a serpentine’ by , is open until 25 October.

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Film by Christian Kingo (unearthed)

16/09/2026

Watch the trailer for ‘Such a Morning’, a feature-length film by Amar Kanwar about two people’s quiet engagement with truth.

It follows a renowned professor and mathematician as he navigates multiple hallucinations that move between speech and silence, fear and freedom, democracy and fascism.

Kanwar’s exhibition opens at Serpentine North on 23 September 2026. Book free tickets on our website.

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Trailer © Amar Kanwar

Introducing the inaugural Future Art Ecosystems R&D Fellows: Alfredo Salazar-Caro (Alfredo Salazar-Caro), Alice Bucknell...
16/09/2026

Introducing the inaugural Future Art Ecosystems R&D Fellows: Alfredo Salazar-Caro (Alfredo Salazar-Caro), Alice Bucknell (Alice), Auriea Harvey (Auriea Harvey), and Reina Mun (outerprobe)!

Over the next six months, the fellows will undertake original research that explores how advances in AI are reshaping cultural production, institutions and public life.

Swipe to explore their research topics, and stay tuned for more updates as the fellowship progresses!

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Design by Roxy Zeiher

Recapping Serpentine Reader, Issue 02: ‘I hope this finds you well’.The essays explore how wellness is performed, manage...
11/09/2026

Recapping Serpentine Reader, Issue 02: ‘I hope this finds you well’.

The essays explore how wellness is performed, managed and sold, even as collective conditions deteriorate. To the contributors, self-help is both unstable and collective: a set of stories we tell ourselves, and each other, about survival, value and possibility.

Contributors: , Eliot Haworth, Alex Quicho (alex quicho), , Anahid Nersessian, Joycelyn Longdon | scholar, writer, storyteller, dj, David Lisbon (Wavy Davy 💻🔥), and Ebun Sodipo (Ebun Sodipo).

Read for free or purchase a print copy, including one unique sticker from a limited set of five designs by Alake Shilling (Alake Shilling), on our website.

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Serpentine Reader is organised and edited by Hanna Girma (Hanna Elyse Girma), with publication design by Louise Camu ().

Visuals by Aleksei Berkov

Address

West Carriage Drive
London
W23XA

Opening Hours

Tuesday 10am - 6pm
Wednesday 10am - 6pm
Thursday 10am - 6pm
Friday 10am - 6pm
Saturday 10am - 6pm
Sunday 10am - 6pm

Telephone

+442074026075

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