FIRST NIGHT | VISUAL ART
Tate Britain rehang review — a compelling new story of British art
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More than 800 works are presented anew — the result will be divisive but it makes for a powerful narrative, says Laura Freeman
The Exhibition Age room at Tate Britain
MALCOLM PARK/ALAMY
The Times
★★★★☆
Who would be a curator today? Damned if you do go woke, damned if you don’t. You can’t please everyone all of the time and there’s no pleasing some people. Given the challenges — culture warriors v the old guard — the Tate Britain rehang, which opens to the public today, does about the best job possible of rejigging the collection for the way we live, look and argue now.
The story is chronological, but each room takes on a theme relevant to the day: Exiles and Dynasties, Court versus Parliament, Metropolis, the Exhibition Age and so on, up to the State We’re In. Works by contemporary artists have been parachuted in. So, if Exiles and Dynasties (1545-1640) tells the story of artistic migrants
