Turner Contemporary is pleased to announce a summer exhibition by Anna Boghiguian (b. Cairo, 1946), taking inspiration from the landscape and coastal history of the gallery’s location in Margate. The Sunken Boat: A glimpse into past histories will run from 14 June to 26 October 2025 and will offer a powerful exploration of global maritime histories and today’s environmental and geopolitical crises. The exhibition reflects Boghiguian’s distinctive practice that challenges viewers to confront the complex and urgent narratives of our shared past and present.
Boghiguian, an Egyptian-Canadian artist of Armenian heritage, creates large-scale installations that combine personal narrative, historical research, and political commentary. Her distinctive visual language—combining painting, drawing, collage, paper-mâché, glass, bronze, and fabric—confronts viewers with questions about colonialism, trade, migration, and ecological devastation. Her figurative work, including large-scale tableaux, is deeply connected to history and storytelling, addressing themes such as the impact of the Industrial Revolution and the climate crisis.
For The Sunken Boat, the artist has developed a site-specific installation responding to Turner Contemporary’s coastal setting. Drawing on stories of a sunken boat that carried enslaved people from West Africa to Liverpool, the installation explores the centrality of the sea in shaping histories of labour, trade, ecological collapse, and political conflict. It combines sculpture, painting, cut-out figures and sound, inviting reflection on rising sea levels and geopolitical tensions around undersea communication cables. The installation is composed of large-scale, brightly coloured cut-outs on Khadi paper using encaustic painting techniques, depicting an underwater scene of a sunken vessel, marine life, and communications infrastructure, that frames the sea as both witness to and active participant in global history.
Key earlier works include The Square, the Line and the Ruler: Ambiguous Philosophers / Ambiguous Politicians (2019), a life-size chess set that critiques power structures, and The Salt Traders (2015), an environmental installation that examines the salt trade’s connections to colonialism and climate change through painted sails and a Roman trading ship sculpture emerging from melting ice.
Boghiguian’s nomadic practice responds to specific locations, creating installations often likened to “giant pop-up books,” where spaces unfold as visitors navigate her installations.
The Sunken Boat promises a rich and multifaceted experience that weaves historical narratives, personal observations, and urgent contemporary concerns, inviting viewers to reconsider the sea’s pivotal role in shaping our collective past and unfolding future.
Clarrie Wallis, Director of Turner Contemporary, says: “We are delighted to present Anna Boghiguian’s thought-provoking and visually compelling work at Turner Contemporary. The Sunken Boat will offer our audiences a deeply engaging and reflective experience, encouraging dialogue around urgent global issues through the lens of maritime history and contemporary geopolitics.”
This exhibition is presented in collaboration with ARoS Aarhus Kunstmuseum and is curated by Sarah Martin with production by Katherine Lloyd.
Press release from Turner Contemporary
Image: Anna Boghiguian. The Square, the Line and the Ruler. Ambiguous Philosophers / Ambiguous Politicians. 2019. Installation view, mumok, Vienna, 2021. Mixed media on paper, laminated on wood. Chessboard: 500 x 500 cm, chess pieces: 150 cm x 80 cm x 1 cm (each). Image courtesy of the artist and mumok – Museum moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig Wien, Leihgabe der Österreichischen Lud-wig-Stiftung
