Joy Through Resistance: He Who Laughs Last, Laughs Best

Joy Through Resistance: He Who Laughs Last, Laughs Best is Yinka Ilori's first solo gallery exhibition in London, on view at Cristea Roberts Gallery through July 11. Known for a practice built on the language of joy, vivid, communal and celebratory, the British-Nigerian artist marks a shift here, turning to art to process grief following the loss of his mother. The resulting multimedia body of work holds sorrow and resilience in the same frame. The title, a phrase his mother often used, signals the show's central proposition: that joy, far from being the absence of hardship, can be its most defiant response. The exhibition brings together new and recent work across painting, print, sculpture, immersive film and sound. The show opened on June 5 to coincide with London Gallery Weekend at Cristea Roberts Gallery, 43 Pall Mall, and runs through July 11, 2026.