Museums And Archives

Activating Serpentine’s Archives

Serpentine’s history is the story of contemporary art in Britain. Since 1970, from Kensington Gardens, London, Serpentine has launched the careers of artists, curated visionary exhibitions, and commissioned new works and architectural programmes, with a transformative impact on contemporary culture. This cultural legacy belongs to everyone. Serpentine has accumulated an extraordinary volume of material documenting our temporary projects and prescient programmes to share with audiences. In 2024/25 we reached 886,507 visitors and 815,122 digital followers, totalling 1,701,629. The proposed Activating Serpentine’s Archives project will systematically approach preservation, digitisation and publication, to make this knowledge accessible, for a more complete, dynamic and expansive art history that is available at any time, globally. Using the archived materials as a resource Serpentine will also create new content for public engagement and activation while establishing structures for archiving and sharing future resources to continue to inspire generations of audiences.