Modern Couples: Art, Intimacy and the Avant-garde, Exhibition, Barbican Centre, London: 10 October 2018- 27 January 2019

As the saying goes, behind every great piece of Modern Art is a great modern couple. And the Barbican Centre believed it was time to get behind the great art, right down to the core: the originators; the couples. By displaying their artwork, letters and photos, the gallery exposes the inner cogs of these creative and intimate relationships, along with their various ways of loving, living and imagining.

The exhibition reveals that none of these 20th century couples were shy: just look at the the brazen way they  paved  their own way in art, love and society. The display certainly proves that love comes in all shapes and sizes: from the conventional to the obsessional; from the fleeting to the life-long; from the exclusive to the polyamorous and from the homosexual to the heterosexual. And how all these variations indiscriminately sparked exploration, creativity, subversion and rebellion.

The  famous partners on display include: Dora Maar & Pablo Picasso; Salvador & Gala Dali; Camille Claudel & Auguste Rodin; Frida Kahlo & Diego Rivera; Emile Floge & Gustav Klimt. This list of renowned artists, and their equally acclaimed lovers, only prove that a long-awaited artistic context has finally arrived.

Barbican Centre:

Level 3, Barbican Centre, Silk Street, London, EC2Y 8DS