About the gallery

Established in London in 1970 by Angela Flowers (1932—2023), Flowers Gallery represents international artists and estates working with a wide range of media in contemporary and Modern art. For over five decades, the gallery has presented more than 900 exhibitions across its global locations, also supporting the production of editions and publications, and installations at art fairs, public galleries, museums, and institutions around the world. Today, the gallery is directed by Angela’s son, Matthew Flowers, with spaces in London and Hong Kong, and a team in New York. 

The gallery programme includes regular major survey shows and renowned recurring London exhibitions such as Artist of the Day and Small is Beautiful, which have formed significant platforms for emerging artists.

The gallery moved to Portland Mews, Soho in 1971, opening with a group exhibition that September. It was subsidised by renting the former basement stables to barrow boys who worked at nearby Berwick Street market. 

Between the two spaces in the early 70s artists exhibited included David Hepher, Arakawa, Ray Johnson, Boyd and Evans, Wendy Taylor, Glenys Barton, Anthony Earnshaw, Deanna Petherbridge, Carole Hodgson and Derek Boshier. Works were regularly placed in the collections of Tate, the British Council,the Arts Council and overseas including the Ludwig Museum, Germany, and the Museum of Modern Art, NY. The gallery started participating at international contemporary art fairs, first exhibiting at Basel in 1971. In 1972 the gallery staged British Drawings 1952-1972, establishing a recurring commitment to significant survey and group exhibitions. In 1974 the gallery began its annual exhibition Small is Beautiful, which is ongoing.

In 1978 the space was sold and nine months later the gallery moved below and then next door to Annely Juda in Tottenham Mews, where it remained for ten years. Artists exhibiting at the gallery during this period included Steve Barraclough, Ana Godel, Micheal Farrell, Amanda Faulkner, Michael Rothenstein, John Keane, Nicola Hicks, Friedemann Hahn, Terry Frost and Peter Howson. It was also the venue that saw the inception of Artist of the Day, a series of one day only exhibitions which is still produced. Innovative group exhibitions continued, including Nudes, Badge Art, Portraits by the Masters of Hollywood Photography and 80 Prints by Modern Masters, which led to the inauguration of the highly popular Print of the Month Club.

Angela Flowers began staging seasonal exhibitions out of her longtime home in Rosscarbery, West Cork, Ireland in 1985, with the first show of William Crozier's work. The summer programme at Rosscarbery ran nearly every summer for 15 years, with occasional exhibitions still produced. 

Alongside a career in music, Angela's son, Matthew Flowers, worked intermittently for the gallery from 1970 until 1983, when he moved to the business full-time. He has remained since, becoming its Managing Director in 1989. 

In 1988 the gallery added an East End venue, Flowers East, on Richmond Road off Mare Street, in the heart of Hackney, with a 4,500 square foot industrial building that was previously a furrier and a private laundry. At the time it was the largest commercial gallery space in London. The first exhibition, Contemporary Portraits, included Lucian Freud, Eduardo Paolozzi, Leon Kossof, Frank Auerbach and Tony Bevan, alongside gallery artists such as John Kirby and Tai Shan Schierenberg. The gallery expanded further in 1991, taking an 18,000 square foot building across the road in a former leather factory. The two vast exhibition spaces allowed the opportunity to put on large, acclaimed shows including, British Abstract Art - Part 1, Painting, co-curated with Bryan Robertson with works by many of the leading living abstract painters including Patrick Heron, Bridget Riley, Tess Jaray, Sean Scully, Michael Kidner, Robyn Denny and John Hoyland. This was followed by a Part 2, Sculpture that included Anish Kapoor, Alison Wilding and Richard Deacon.

In the mid-1990s a temporary small gallery was opened in Silver Place, Soho, to maintain links to the West End. In the 90s two gallery artists were commissioned by the Imperial War Museum to document the era's wars - John Keane (Persian Gulf) and Peter Howson (Bosnia). 

In 1998 after exhibiting at US fairs for many years including Art Chicago from 1987 and Miami and LA Art Fairs from 1989, the gallery opened in Los Angeles at Santa Monica's Bergamot Station Arts Center. Its US operations moved to New York in 2003, initially uptown at 1000 Madison Avenue, and then in 2009 to Chelsea where it remained for 10 years. Today the gallery has a Director based in New York City, with private viewings throughout the US arranged by appointment. 

In 2000, the gallery opened on Cork Street, Mayfair, and in 2002 it moved from Hackney to Kingsland Road, Shoreditch, to 12,000 square feet spread over three floors of a 19th-century warehouse. The early 2000's saw the gallery take on the Scottish artist Ken Currie and further growth of the photography programme, working with artists including Edward Burtynsky, Robert Polidori, Mona Kuhn, Nadav Kander, Julie Cockburn and Shen Wei.

After several years of running an office and exhibiting at fairs in Asia, the gallery opened a space in central Hong Kong in 2020, the year the gallery celebrated its 50th Anniversary with 50 x 50 and 50 Years, exhibitions in its two London galleries showcasing the breadth of the artists and programming developed over the last five decades. In 2023, the gallery commenced a series of US-based nomadic, artist-led projects and residencies, complementing programming in its London and Hong Kong spaces.