ART|WRITING|CREATIVE WRITING

Notes on the Noah Davis Retrospective at the Barbican

An ideas-rich artist who left us too soon

Painting for My Dad by Noah Davis (all photos by author)

Most of the time when I go to an art exhibition I try to read as little as I can about the show. I don’t want a star rating-based review to cloud my judgement. I rarely regret my decision.

The Noah Davis retrospective at the Barbican (on display until Sunday 11th May 2025) validates my approach.

I knew nothing about Noah’s work. What greeted me (bear in mind that my partner and I saw the exhibition back to front as we didn’t realise we were at the tail end of it when we entered the gallery rather than at the beginning) was a range of paintings that thrilled and dazzled in equal measure.

His life cut short by cancer at just thirty-two, Davis was hugely prolific. He left behind more than 400 paintings and countless projects. In an interview screened as part of the exhibition, he tells the interviewer that art-making was all he ever wanted to do. The only thing he could do. And, my God, he did it well!

There’s the six ballerinas en pointe outside what looks like houses in the projects (council estates for British readers). The beautiful symmetry cut in half by a telephone mast. A mother and her child are waiting…