Call for papers: Cultural Reckonings

Rex Whistler’s mural In Pursuit of Rare Meats 1927, which decorates the walls of Tate Britain’s former restaurant, contains racist scenes. While the mural has been the subject of discussions since the 1970s, its visibility on social media in 2020 brought these debates under renewed public scrutiny. Following concerns from visitors and staff, Tate’s Board of Trustees made the decision in late 2020 to close the restaurant and seek new ways to present the mural. In 2022 Tate commissioned the artist Keith Piper to create a response to the work. 

The COVID-19 pandemic and Black Lives Matter protests in 2020 ignited institutional debates on systemic racism. In museums these debates often centred around the critical question of what to do with cultural heritage that includes racist imagery or artworks that are linked to forms of oppression such as racism, sexism and imperialism. The questions are especially complex where artworks and cultural artefacts are integrated in the physical fabric of a city or institution and cannot be consigned to storage or conveniently forgotten. They are further complicated by the realities of national political contexts, including government policies, and the way they impact public institutions. 

Tate Papers is seeking contributions that examine contemporary responses to legacies of racism and oppression in art and its institutions. Possible areas of focus include: 

–Examinations of the challenges involved in addressing historical artworks and other examples of cultural heritage that contain offensive imagery or are linked to forms of oppression such as racism, sexism and imperialism
–Considerations of the ways art practice can engage with such histories by revealing or transforming historical relationships and power structures
–Analysis of responses to legacies of oppression where artworks are integrated in the physical fabric (or integrated in some other way–for example, naming) of a city or institution
–Case studies or analyses of institutions as facilitators of collaborative meaning-making in critical relation to offensive artworks or heritage relating to histories of oppression
–Consideration of cultural heritage in relation to the realities of national political contexts, including government policies such as ‘retain and explain’ in the UK and their impact on public institutions
–The presentation and management of public statues and monuments 

We also welcome practice submissions of artworks that respond to these focus areas. 

Please send submissions via email, including your full name and affiliation, as well as those of any co-authors or contributors. 

Deadline for submissions: Monday November 2, 2026 

Submissions received after the deadline will not be considered. 

Before submitting an article, we recommend reviewing past articles published in Tate Papers and consulting our submission guidelines. For more information on editorial policy, criteria for publication and our peer review process, see About Tate Papers.