A new exhibition at the Wellcome Collection showcases ageing, beyond biology, and examines how it is shaped by inequality, culture and everyday life.
Titled ‘The Coming of Age’, the show brings together more than 120 artworks, objects and research projects that present ageing as a social issue shaped by policy, access and inequality, as much as by the body itself.
As life expectancy rises, it asks a direct question: who gets to age well?
One statistic highlighted in the show notes that one in ten children in the UK today are expected to live beyond 100. The exhibition places that alongside the reality that access to health, stability and care remains uneven, shaping very different experiences of ageing.
Rather than focusing only on old age, it looks at ageing across the full life course.
One section draws on Age of Wonder, a major research project based in Bradford that studies adolescence. It shows how early-life conditions, including health and environment, influence outcomes decades later.
Another key project is Uncertain Futures, led by artist Suzanne Lacy in collaboration with Manchester Art Gallery.
The work brings together 100 women from different communities, focusing on visibility, ageing and inequality, particularly for women over 50.
The exhibition also spans contemporary and historical pieces and includes Sebald Beham’s 1536 The Fountain of Youth, alongside pieces by Paula Rego, John Coplans, Serena Korda, Anna Maria Maiolino and Rory Pilgrim.
These works move between historical ideas of youth and contemporary questions of care, identity and time.
The Wellcome Collection, located near Euston in north London, is a free museum and library exploring health through cultural and scientific perspectives.
Opened in 2007, it is part of the Wellcome Trust and holds extensive collections linked to medicine and human experience.
The Coming of Age exhibit will be open to the public until 29th November 2026.
