Exhibition on Screen: James McNeill Whistler

Whistler's Mother Comes to the Barn

The Barn Theatre's cinema turns over an afternoon to David Bickerstaff's new film for the Exhibition on Screen series, built around Tate Britain's first major James McNeill Whistler retrospective in three decades.

Whistler ran alongside the Impressionists without quite becoming one, admired by Van Gogh and Manet while insisting art needed no purpose beyond itself. He named his paintings the way musicians name compositions, arrangements, harmonies, nocturnes, and the film follows that thinking through to his most reproduced and most parodied work, Arrangement in Grey and Black No. 1, the portrait everyone knows as Whistler's Mother. Made with Tate Britain's cooperation, the 90-minute film pairs footage from the exhibition with the story of the man who painted his way out of Victorian convention.

The Financial Times called it dazzling, and a single afternoon screening at Cirencester's own cinema is the closest most of us will get to that Tate Britain retrospective this year.

Monday 21 September 2026 · The Barn Theatre, 5 Beeches Road, Cirencester, Gloucestershire GL7 1BN · Starts 2:00pm