Yuki Kihara: Darwin in Paradise Camp Visitor Experience Tour

Join Oliver, one of our Visitor Team Assistants, to learn more about the themes and artworks contained within Yuki Kihara's exhibition Darwin in Paradise Camp.

Oliver will provide an overview of the exhibition and elaborate on Kihara's investment in revisiting the work of Paul Gauguin and Charles Darwin, the contemporary experience of third gender communities in Sāmoan culture, and the artist's blending of personal and institutional archival materials in her creative practice.

Yuki Kihara Darwin in Paradise Camp | Whitworth Art Gallery

📅28 February 2026

⏰2:00pm - 2:45pm

📍the Whitworth

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Kihara's new work Darwin Drag engages with research into how famed evolutionary biologist Charles Darwin shaped his findings to suggest that sexual diversity in animals was rare and unnatural, to conform with the conservative values of the Victorian period.

Placed within Paradise Camp, Kihara responds to famous paintings of Tahiti and its people by French modernist artist Paul Gauguin (1848-1903). Through archival research, Kihara links Gauguin’s paintings to colonial photographs taken in Sāmoa.

Collaborating with Fa’afafine models and production crew, Kihara repurposes these cultural artefacts to speak to, and from, queer Indigenous worlds.

About the venue

The Whitworth is a venue with level access throughout, and facilities to support you during your visit. Alongside this our visitor team will be on hand to assist you in the gallery. Find out more about planning your visit to the Whitworth and accessibility information for you.

If you’d like to speak to a team member about any access or additional needs, please get in touch with the gallery and we will be happy to assist you. Email whitworth@manchester.ac.uk or telephone 0161 275 7450.

The Whitworth art gallery and gardens is driven by a mission to work with communities to use art for positive social change, and actively addresses what matters most in people’s lives. We are proudly part of The University of Manchester, operating as a convening space between the University and the people of the city.