Delaine Le Bas: Un-Fair-Ground
13 February – 31 May 2026
Delaine Le Bas’s first solo show in Manchester presents an expansive overview of the artist’s groundbreaking feminist practice, including painting on calico, drawing, embroidery, video, and performance. Informed by Le Bas’s studies in fashion design, her deep engagement with folklore and witchcraft, and her Romany heritage, the exhibition unfolds as an immersive mixed-media environment of found and invented images that move beyond racial, political and sexual borders.
Watch the Delaine Le Bas teaser on YouTube
Un-Fair-Ground brings together key works from across the artist’s career with new pieces, shown in dialogue with artworks from the Whitworth’s collection. The exhibition begins with the monumental mural Un-Fair-Ground (2024), originally created for Glastonbury Music Festival and reconstructed at the Whitworth – a vivid fusion of myth, pop culture, and activist politics.
Throughout the galleries, Le Bas questions art historical hierarchies by placing an eclectic selection of artworks from the Whitworth’s collection into an iconoclastic display. Inspired by The Metabolic Museum (2020) by theorist and curator Clémentine Deliss, Le Bas has chosen to display works from the Musgrave Kinley Outsider Art Collection, including Madge Gill and Judith Scott, alongside established modernists such as Giorgio de Chirico and canonical British artists including William Blake, creating unexpected encounters across time, genre, and reputation.
At the heart of the exhibition is a performance space, facilitating new forms of engagement with the artists’ practice and hosting live events. Here, Le Bas has collaborated with Manchester-based artists Leslie Thompson and Sarah Lee from Venture Arts. Paintings and embroideries made by Thompson and Lee during creative sessions with the artist are displayed alongside Le Bas’s own work, extending the exhibition’s collaborative and inclusive spirit.
The exhibition is organised by the Whitworth, The University of Manchester and co-curated by Delaine Le Bas with Valentin Diakonov, Curator (Modern and Contemporary Art) and Hannah Vollam, Assistant Curator (Art) at the Whitworth.
Image Credit: Delaine Le Bas Un-Fair-Ground detail at Unfairground Glastonbury Festival 2024. Courtesy of the artist, ISOR CIC, RTA Collection. Delaine Le Bas was assisted by Rose Waudby. Photographer: Stephen Devine. Exhibition credit: The exhibition is organised by the Whitworth, The University of Manchester.
Further information:
- Opening times: Wednesday to Sunday, 10.00 am-5.00 pm; open until 9.00 pm on Thursdays
- Location: The University of Manchester, Oxford Road, Manchester, M15 6ER
- Getting there: By foot: 20-30 minures from Manchester city centre; By Bike: Sheffield stands and lockers (£1 coin, refundable) both available at the gallery; By Bus: 15, 41, 42, 43, 140 – 143, 147 – ask for bus stop nearest MRI, Oxford Road; By Metrolink: St Peter’s Square (plus 10 minutes on the bus or 20 minutes on foot); Train: Oxford Road (plus 10 minutes on the bus or 20 minutes on foot); By Car: On-street parking (maximum stay, 2 hours) on Denmark Road. Nearest car park Cecil Street
- Admission is free
