iDulwich Picture Gallery · Dulwich
David Shrigley
Contemporary artist David Shrigley's specially commissioned works enter into conversation with Dutch and Flemish 17th-century painters including Jan Steen, Rembrandt and Brueghel the Younger, exploring humour across centuries.
Preview: written before the show opened
In Adriaen Brouwer's Interior of a Tavern (c.1630), two men smoke in a tobacco inn, one stuffing his pipe, and a chalked tally on the stool counts the beers they've had. To the right, a man is caught urinating against a post. Dulwich has owned the panel since 1811, and it hangs in this show.
David Shrigley has made new works, none shown before, that answer 17th-century Dutch and Flemish paintings by Brouwer, Jan Steen, Teniers, Van Ostade, Brueghel the Younger and Rembrandt, from Dulwich's collection plus major loans. Co-curator Helen Hillyard's case is that Shrigley, like those painters, "has an instinct for finding the funny side of everyday life". It is his first solo show in a UK public museum since his Hayward retrospective in 2012. If your only Shrigley is a mug, this time he gets Rembrandt for company.
Tickets weren't on sale by October 2026. Gallery Friends get guaranteed access, from £46 a year (£74 with a guest), and under-18s go free.
Look for
Brouwer's Interior of a Tavern
Look for the chalked beer tally on the stool beside two pipe smokers, and the man relieving himself against a post on the right.
With kids
Under-18s go free at Dulwich.
Also at Dulwich Picture Gallery
On now nearby
Image credits
5
- David ShrigleyCourtesy of Dulwich Picture Gallery
- Richard Dadd: Beyond BedlamCourtesy of Royal Academy of Arts
- Serpentine Pavilion 2026 by LANZA atelier© LANZA atelier. Photo: Iwan Baan. Courtesy Serpentine.
- The Wallace Collection at WarCourtesy of Wallace Collection
- Dulwich Picture GalleryJulian Osley / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0