UNHCR Goodwill Ambassador Cate Blanchett supports the portrait installation by English artist, Es Devlin, in partnership with UK for UNHCR, The Courtauld, and King’s College London. The installation is free and you can book it here.

CONGREGATION features large-scale chalk and charcoal portraits of 50 Londoners who have experienced forced displacement from their homelands. Presented as a projection-mapped tiered sculpture, the work offers a luminous encounter with those who bring their gifts to London.

Each evening at 7:00 PM, the installation will be accompanied by free choral performances fusing the voices of The Genesis Sixteen, The London Bulgarian Choir and the South African Cultural Gospel Choir in the pedestrianised area outside The Courtauld.

The work has been co-authored by the 50 portrait sitters – reflecting on their lives in London, as well as their journeys from more than 25 countries, including Syria, Sudan, Ukraine and Afghanistan. The accompanying soundscape is composed by Polyphonia, with film sequences created in collaboration with filmmaker Ruth Hogben and choreographer Botis Seva.

Curated by Ekow Eshun and developed in collaboration with King’s College London and The Courtauld, the work takes place at the jewel-like eighteenth-century church of St Mary le Strand.

It will be open to the public from the 4th to the 9th of October, 2024, coinciding with Frieze London.