Joy Gregory in Conversation with Gilane Tawadros - Whitechapel Gallery

Joy Gregory in Conversation with Gilane Tawadros

  • Joy Gregory Blonde

    Joy Gregory, Stockwell Siren from the series ‘Celebrity Blonde’, 2003. Performance. © Joy Gregory

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Past Event


This event was on Thu 27 Nov, 6.30 - 8pm

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Joy Gregory in Conversation with Gilane Tawadros

This event is now fully booked. Please contact infodesk@whitechapelgallery.org or call +44 (0)20 7522 7888 to be added to the waitlist.

Join artist Joy Gregory for an intimate conversation with Director of Whitechapel Gallery Gilane Tawadros, tracing the development of her artistic practice over time and speaking to her profound influence on the cultural landscape through the lens of her new exhibition, Catching Flies with Honey. 

Spanning four decades, this landmark exhibition at Whitechapel Gallery brings together over 250 works encompassing photography, film, installation and textiles, all of which showcase and celebrate Gregory’s inventive, culturally resonant and materially rich practice.  

Her work explores identity, history, race, gender and societal ideals of beauty, while expanding photography’s aesthetic and material possibilities.  Gregory employs a diverse range of media and methods, encompassing Victorian photographic techniques such as cyanotypes and kallitypes, as well as digital media and performance. Conceptually rigorous and visually seductive, Gregory’s work invites important reflection on power structures, representation and cultural memory. 

In this event, we will use the exhibition to interrogate Gregory’s status as pioneering force in contemporary photography, her enduring legacy and influence on a generation of artists and practitioners working with photography today, and situate her work within the broader landscape of British and international visual art. 

This event accompanies our exhibition Joy Gregory: Catching Flies with Honey.

Attendees to this event can access an exclusive 20% discount on the accompanying book to the exhibition, Joy Gregory: Catching Flies with Honey – a new richly illustrated monograph surveying Gregory’s forty-year career, including essays by leading scholars who situate her practice as a vital contribution to global discourses on race, gender and the politics of seeing.

To redeem this discount, please select the “Admission + Book” option when purchasing your ticket – your monograph will be available to collect from the info desk on the night of the event. 

Joy Gregory

Joy Gregory is a graduate of Manchester Polytechnic and the Royal College of Art. She has developed a practice which is concerned with social and political issues with particular reference to history and cultural differences in contemporary society. 

As a photographer she makes full use of the media from video, digital and analogue photography to Victorian print processes. In 2002, Gregory received the NESTA Fellowship, which enabled her the time and the freedom to research for a major piece around language endangerment. The first of this series was the video piece Gomera, which premiered at the Sydney Biennale in May 2010. 

She is the recipient of numerous awards and has exhibited all over the world showing in many festivals and biennales. Her work included in many collections including the UK Arts Council Collection, Victoria and Albert Museum, Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane, Australia, and Yale British Art Collection. She currently lives and works in London. 

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