The exhibition will run at the gallery from the 9th October until the 7th February 2027.
The National Portrait Gallery has unveiled further details for a new exhibition created by renowned photographer Tim Walker, presenting a body of new work celebrating Queer culture and life.
This new show is a result of five years of connecting with Queer people and their allies in Britain and beyond and marks a decisive shift in Walker’s artistic focus.
Tim Walker first came to public attention in the 1990s with his unique style of fantastical photography. Since then, his fashion pictures and portraits have graced the pages of magazines such as Vogue, Vanity Fair, W, Love, Another Man and i-D.
Curated by Susanna Brown, the exhibition engages with the historical gallery setting, presenting both unsung heroes and established giants of Queer history. Designed by Walker’s longtime collaborator Shona Heath with support from the National Portrait Gallery, Walker spotlights some 250 activists, social workers, nightlife performers, musicians and superstars in this display.
The exhibition is set to open with portraits of trailblazers who spent the 1970s and 80s bravely advocating for the right to love. They include founding members of the Gay Liberation Front and Stonewall, among them Olivette Cole-Wilson, Andrew Lumsden, Lisa Power and Tom Robinson. Walker memorialises his own ‘queeristocracy’ in a style inspired by sixteenth-century portraits of Tudor aristocracy by Hans Holbein the Younger and Nicholas Hilliard.
Meanwhile, another group of Queer changemakers, such as Ted Brown, Caroline Paige, Gilli Salvat and Peter Tatchell, are shown alongside storytellers who made Queerness visible in the late 20th century, including James Ivory and Sarah Waters. Walker invited each sitter to bring a meaningful object to their portrait session: author Jane Cholmeley presents the original shop sign from Silver Moon Women’s Bookshop, founded in 1984; photographer Sunil Gupta holds his camera; and filmmaker Isaac Julien clasps a conch shell, a motif from his pioneering 1989 film Looking for Langston. Walker then photographed those working today for a better future, among them Liz Carr, Shon Faye, Francis Lee, Lady Phyll, E-J Scott, and Kae Tempest. Nearly all these portraits are set against deceivingly simple white backgrounds, in a style reminiscent of the work of Richard Avedon, whom Walker assisted in the 1990s.
The exhibition will also pay tribute to to the many people who came together in solidarity and action in response to the HIV/AIDS crisis of the 1980s. Walker’s photographs of nurses and healthcare professionals who developed effective treatments for the disease are displayed alongside musicians who soundtracked the era, including Marc Almond, Holly Johnson, and Jimmy Somerville.
In addition, a room at the heart of the display is dedicated to large-scale portraits of post-punk collective the Rebel Dykes, inspired by Karlheinz Weinberger’s photographs of 1960s biker gangs. These are accompanied by a short film in which the women reflect on the importance of community and their campaigns for nuclear disarmament, environmentalism, sex positive feminism and HIV solidarity.
There will also be portraits of designers Jean Paul Gaultier and Michaela Stark, drag performers Paul O’Grady, David Hoyle and Midgitte Bardot, personalities Alan Carr and Sue Perkins, and actors Ncuti Gatwa, Hunter Schafer, Fiona Shaw and Ben Whishaw, among many others. International music stars and icons Björk, Lady Gaga, Boy George, Frank Ocean, and Chappell Roan are also pictured.
The show will reach its climax with a room of staged erotic scenes which subvert fairy tales and nursery rhymes through a Queer lens. Walker contextualises these works saying, “the greatest thing I learned from the activists, storytellers and performers who make up Fairyland is how essential eroticism and humour are. It’s the very heart of what we’re talking about when we talk about Queerness. A place where you can desire and be desired. A place where you can be whoever you want to be.”
To find out more and to book tickets click here.