Emerging Artist Exhibitions
Established in 2013, Copeland Gallery has been a key contributor to the rise of Peckham’s art scene. Hosting hundreds of shows and events, the gallery has welcomed a diverse range of emerging artists, global brands, and high-profile events.
Copeland Gallery is a blank canvas, dry hire venue which is an ideal project space for artists to transform for their exhibitions.
We recognise that raising funds for new projects can be difficult. The Emerging Artist Exhibitions at Copeland Gallery are an opportunity for early career solo artists and collectives to access a large gallery space at a heavily discounted price.
Last year Copeland Gallery provided community rates to 2 blocks of Emerging Artist Exhibitions featuring a diverse range of work across a multitude of mediums, and drawing inspiration from South and East Asia, Malawi and Eastern Europe, as well as closer to home.
For 2026, applications will again be open across 2 blocks with 2 sets of dates to apply for.
If you’re a new and emerging artist or collective looking to organise an exhibition in 2026, we’d love to hear from you!
Download the info pack below for all the details on how to apply.
Emerging Artist Exhibitions - Block 2 2026
Unanchored City
This exhibition brings together visual art, performance, and sound-based practices, alongside related theatre performance and sound workshop.
Human:being
Human:being, a photography based exhibition, offers a creative and thought-provoking space in which to pause and connect with the intricacies and diversities of being human.
A Quiet Leap Forward
A Quiet Leap Forward is a collaborative exhibition between multi-disciplinary visual artists Kome Eleyae and G3negraphy, creating a series of large and small scale mixed-media pieces and writings.
Emerging Artist Exhibitions - Block 1 2026
Choreo-Graphic Systems: Bodies, Tech and Justice
Come experience a weekend filled with immersive installations, experimental films, moving performances and more.
Living Threaded: A Studio of Becoming
Living Threaded: A Studio of Becoming transforms Copeland Gallery into a working studio where care, visibility, and co-creation take centre stage.
Emerging Artist Exhibitions - Block 2 2025
Sapiens
Rooted in the ancient human impulse to tell stories, 'Sapiens' explores the power of collective imagination and the role of narrative in shaping how we talk about ourselves and the world.
BOH BOH: A Familiar Stranger
The debut solo exhibition by British-Malawian photographer Gift JR Gwambe - intimate documentary scenes blur with humanist portraiture, revealing the harmony and joy of daily life in rural and suburban Malawi.
Bit Rot
The Phreaking Collective invites you to Bit Rot, a group exhibition that explores the fragility, decay, and obsolescence of our digital age.
WE FELL IN LOVE ON THE INTERNET
Cane-Yo's work exists at the strange threshold between the analogue and the virtual, taking digital ephemera and turning them into painted meditations on contemporary image culture.
Emerging Artist Exhibitions - Block 1 2025
Space, Place &nd Identity
Presenting the work of recent graduates from the MA Photography & Urban Cultures program at Goldsmiths, University of London.
The Rethinking Eastern Europe project presents: In The Space Between Words
The works in this show engage with both the visible and invisible boundaries that define “Eastern Europe”, questioning notions of division, belonging, heritage and transformation.
Southerly: Breath of Anxiety
Inspired by Hermann Hesse’s first novel ‘Peter Camenzind’, the exhibition will centre on the grandeur of nature and the human sense of finitude, highlighting how nature evokes feelings of awe and anxiety.
Previous partnerships
The Black Creatives Exhibition
In celebration of Black History Month, The Black Creatives Exhibition will showcase a vibrant array of Black artists, photographers, and graphic designers.
On the Surface
On the Surface is a collaborative curatorial exhibition by Rosie Zielinski and Nigel Fovargue. The exhibition will explore the multidisciplinary dialogues within contemporary practices which examine the tactile surface through texture, composition and material enquiry.
Quotidian Conjurings
Quotidian Conjurings converges conceptual portraiture with Black feminist themes of survival, fugitivity and becoming to explore the multi-dimensional effects of intersectional trauma on the mind, body and spirit.
and you would have to believe it
'and you would have to believe it' is a contemporary art show curated by the Critical Edge Collective.
Queens of the Wall
Showcasing the very best in contemporary urban art, Queens of the Wall will feature 25 artists from the collective, showcasing their work in Copeland Gallery, Peckham in celebration of International Women’s Day.
No More Eugene
A journey through the London Borough of Southwark, seeing first-hand the artistic expressions of youngsters navigating growing up in the city.
Hold Fast
A reflective, optimistic and uplifting exhibition of work by three female creators with a special culinary collaboration for the opening night by MasterChef UK winner and judge Steven Wallis.
Layers: Looking Inside HMP Holloway
Power Play Productions and Daddyless Daughters presents a groundbreaking exhibition of photographic portraits, letters and films from 30 former prisoners of HMP Holloway.