A juried group exhibition by submission to be held in our gallery in Hackney, London, UK in November.

Open to all.
No theme or restrictions.
One entry per artist or group.

International submissions more than welcome, just keep in mind that the logistics of getting physical works to and from the gallery will be your responsibility.

Deadline for submissions: Sunday, August 10th, 2025.

 

The selections will be made by Marianne Keating, Daniella Rose King. Third selector to be confirmed shortly.

There is no application form. Just send an email  to opencruel@rubycruel.com with a single image of the work you wish to have considered OR a single page PDF proposal for a work OR a single link in the case of audio/video works.

In the email please include YOUR NAME, WORK TITLE, MATERIALS, YEAR OF PRODUCTION and DIMENSIONS. A brief description and installation or hanging suggestions can be included.

Then click HERE, and if no luck HERE, to donate £10 to keep us doing what we do. Please leave a note of the name used on your submission so we can link the donation! EMAIL + DONATION = an email entry confirmation from us.

Those selected will be notified by early September. We look forward to seeing your work!

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More on our selectors:

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Marianne Keating is an Irish artist and researcher based in London. She was shortlisted to represent Ireland in the 2022 Venice Biennial and has exhibited extensively throughout Ireland and internationally. Her large-scale commissioned film work 'An Talamh/The Plain' is currently showing in the Irish Pavilion at the World Expo, Japan. She is an Associate Lecturer at the Royal College of Art, London.

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Daniella Rose King is a British-Barbadian curator, writer, and lecturer based in London. She is Lead Curator of the new Collections Gallery at Wellcome Collection and was previously Adjunct Curator for Caribbean Diasporic Art at Tate. Her most recent project, Sargasso Sea, was staged at the ICA Philadelphia in 2024 and her writing appears in many exhibition catalogues as well as in monographs on artists such as Simone Leigh, Firelei Báez, and John Lyons.

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Our third selector to be confirmed shortly.

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To be clear ... for artists selected for OPEN CRUEL the possible outcomes of participation would be exposure of their work to a London audience by being shown in our physical gallery space and exposure to a wider international audience through our social media reach. Work in the exhibition can be sold, if the artist wishes, so there is the potential for sales - less a reasonable commission. We ask for a £10 donation to submit your work because we are a non-profit organisation without funding. We exist solely to provide a platform for artists and can't do it without support.

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