Free exhibitions to see in London in November 2026

Two shows to see in London this month, both free to enter. One is a first UK exhibition by an American sculptor, the other brings together more than fifty years of work by a British painter.


Liz Larner: A hard line to bend

Installation views of Liz Larner, "A hard line to bend" at Camden Art Centre, 2026.image credit Rob Harris.

The first exhibition at a major UK institution by the American sculptor Liz Larner, born in 1960, bringing together works mostly from the last ten years. For three decades Larner has explored the potential of sculpture to affect and expand our embodied encounter with the world, and the show is focused on her ecological concerns and her continued experiments in material and form. Informed by post-human and eco-feminist thought, the works consider transformation, from ancient myth and cosmology to the cycles of matter. Her ongoing series of ceramic slabs appears alongside assemblages of discarded single-use plastics and a series of ceramic asteroids, many named after female mythic figures as their counterparts in space are. A new work, A hard line to bend (2026), is inspired by Lilith, a figure with ancient origins associated with self-determination, female autonomy, dream and the night.

Date: 11 September 2026 - 17 January 2027. Location: Camden Art Centre, Arkwright Road, London NW3 6DG. Price: Free. camdenartcentre.org

Bridget Riley

Install view, Bridget Riley at Hazlitt Holland-Hibbert, 2026, courtesy the artist.

A selection of works from three periods of Bridget Riley's career, from 1962 to 2015, united by her concern with conveying the experience of sight. Riley was born in London in 1931 and gained international recognition in 1965 through her inclusion in The Responsive Eye at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, followed by the International Prize for Painting at the Venice Biennale in 1968. The works follow three stages of her practice, beginning with the black and white abstraction she started in 1961 and held to until she introduced colours such as red and blue in 1966. A trip to Egypt in the winter of 1979 to 1980 led to the stripe paintings, later disrupted with a diagonal hatching so the shapes seem to advance forward. From around 1997 until 2010 she returned to the curve she had first used in the 1960s, this time as a way of carrying colour across the canvas in a steadier rhythm.

Date: 1 October - 27 November 2026. Location: Hazlitt Holland-Hibbert, 38 Bury Street, St James's, London SW1Y 6BB. Price: Free. hh-h.com