BRITISH ARTIST Barbara Walker (b. 1964) is now represented by Victoria Miro. Walker makes figurative drawings and paintings that explore issues of race, gender, class, power, representation and belonging.
In recognition of her highly regarded practice, specifically “Burden of Proof,” a series of drawings installed at the Sharjah Biennial 15 in the United Arab Emirates, Walker was nominated for the 2023 Turner Prize.
“I have long admired Barbara Walker’s exceptional work. Her intensely empathetic drawings and paintings that bring to the fore stories of belonging, visibility, power, and representation have resonated deeply with me,” Victoria Miro said in the Oct. 2 announcement.
“Barbara’s residency in our Venice studio last year resulted in a remarkable series of self-portraits created in dialogue with Old Masters such as Veronese and Tintoretto, which we exhibited earlier this year. I very much look forward to our new collaboration.”
Walker was born in Birmingham, UK, where she continues to live and work. A child of the Windrush generation, her work is informed by her biography, growing up in the UK with Jamaican immigrant parents and the political, cultural, and social experiences of her family and community.
“Barbara Walker: Being Here” the first major institutional solo show of the artist opened at The Whitworth at the University of Manchester in 2024 and traveled to Arnolfini in Bristol, earlier this year. Nearly 60 works, spanning the 1990s to present were on view, including rarely seen early paintings of Walker’s family. The exhibition earned her the Sky Arts Visual Arts Award 2025, which celebrates British and Irish arts across disciplines.
“I have long admired Barbara Walker’s exceptional work. Her intensely empathetic drawings and paintings that bring to the fore stories of belonging, visibility, power, and representation have resonated deeply with me.” — Victoria Miro
BARBARA WALKER, “End of the Affair II,” 2025 (conté, charcoal and pastel on paper, 1.5 × 1.2 m). | Photo © Tate, Matt Greenwood and Yili Liu
“Barbara Walker: Any Time, Any Place, Any Where” (March 22–May 3, 2025), a solo exhibition of the artist was on view at Victoria Miro in Venice, Italy. She was first featured in group shows at the gallery—”LEDA and the SWAN: a myth of creation and destruction” in London, from 2023-24, and “Chiaroscuro: A Century of Charcoal,” which was presented earlier this year across the gallery’s spaces in London and Venice, where Walker’s work was shown.
Victoria Miro presented new works by Walker at Frieze London in October. Walker’s work, “End of the Affair II” (2025), was one of three works acquired by the Tate through the Frieze Tate Fund during Frieze London and Frieze Masters 2025.
Walker’s career spans more three decades. Her work has been exhibited internationally and is represented in many public and private collections, most notably Tate and the British Museum. In the United States, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, The Wadsworth Atheneum, and the Yale Center for British Art have acquired her work.
“Since my formative years, I have admired and respected Victoria Miro gallery’s unwavering commitment to its artists and its transformative vision for contemporary art,” Walker said. “To now be welcomed into that vision is an honour both surreal and deeply meaningful. I am thrilled to begin this new chapter.” CT
TOP IMAGE (right): Portrait of Barbara Walker, 2025. | Courtesy the artist and Victoria Miro. Photo by Chris Keenan
Barbara Walker talks about her practice from her studio in Birmingham, UK. The artist works on paper, canvas, and also produces installations. Walker said: “When I’m working, it’s like the air I breathe is like life itself and I’m happy when I’m working.” | Video by Tate
BOOKSHELF
Now hard to find, “Barbara Walker” is the first volume dedicated to the artist. The book was published on the occasion of “Place, Space, Who,” Barbara Walker’s 2021 installation at Turner Contemporary in Margate UK. With contributions by Paul Gilroy, Sarah Martin, and Aïcha Mehrez, with an artist interview conducted by Courtney J. Martin, the volume won the 2023 Historians Of British Art Prize for Exemplary Exhibition Catalogue. Also hard to come by, the exhibition catalog “Barbara Walker: Being Here” accompanied the artist’s first major institutional solo show in 2024. Walker was among the artists featured in “The Time is Always Now: Artists Reframe Black Figure,” the catalog and international traveling exhibition edited/curated by Ekow Eshun.
