Susan Aldworth: Belongings

This is one of two exhibitions opening in April 2026 from artist Susan Aldworth whose work explores our sense of self.

In the immersive installation BELONGINGS, anti-immigration narratives are challenged as it aims to create pathways for belonging with people seeking sanctuary. Featuring the imagined contents of the suitcase the artist’s grandmother brought with her when she was migrating from Northern Italy to London in 1924, the installation features thirty-five individual antique clothes. Suspended in mid-air, they highlight the transitory and emotional nature of an uprooted life.

BELONGINGS has grown in response to current discussion, tension and research into global migration, forced displacement, sanctuary and mental health where political rhetoric ignores individual stories of hope, change, refuge and difficulty. This exhibition explores the artist's grandmother’s migration just over a hundred years ago (1924) in the context of the large number of women currently seeking refuge from Ukraine, Afghanistan, and Syria today, driven by her desire to share how every refugee or migrant has their own story to tell and her distress about the current hard-line anti-immigration stance of the UK government accompanied by a growing anti-immigrant rhetoric in the media. In the immersive installation, 35 antique pieces of clothing are hand embroidered with family photographs, recipes, messages and stories. Responding to the installation throughout its run will be a series of artworks created by migrant groups based in Edinburgh. 

Please join us for Modern Alchemy: Behind the Scenes of an Art-Science Collaboration on 16 April. Click here for more information.  

Images: Alan Dimmick

Susan Aldworth

Susan Aldworth (born 1955) has a background in philosophy, and a strong interest in investigating the workings of the human mind, especially consciousness and our sense of self. Her work on the relationship between the physical brain and our sense of identity has linked her with the Art & Science movement in the UK since the late 1990s, and has been an associate lecturer on the MA Art & Science at Central St Martins. Aldworth is also interested in the lived experience, and her experimental work in print, drawing, installation and time-based media interrogates the personal, medical, medicated, scientific and philosophical narratives on which we build our notions of self.

Working as an artist-in-residence in a medical or academic setting is central to her practice, giving her access to scientists, patients and health professionals as well as philosophers and art historians. Her work is held in many public and private collections including the V&A, the British Museum, The Fitzwilliam Museum, the British Library and The Wellcome Collection Library in the UK, and Williams College Museum of Art in the USA. Aldworth has exhibited widely both nationally and internationally. Aldworth is represented by TAG Fine Art, and is a regular presenter on BBC Radio 3 and 4.