

At our gallery, VOLT, we commission four exhibitions by emerging and underrepresented artists in the Southeast each year. We host a range of free engagement activities alongside each exhibition, including family and community workshops and artist talks.
Our commissions aim to support artists to experiment, work in new ways, or contextualise their practice on their own terms. Our ethos is artist-led and collaborative. We are proud to follow the exciting next steps of the artists we work with. You can view our archive of exhibitions below.
We recognise the vital contribution of artists in society and believe artists should be paid fairly for their time. Our exhibition budgets are on average £5,000, and £1,500 of this is ring fenced to artist fees. We don’t ask an artist to produce an exhibition of entirely new works for this sum, instead we work with each artist to commission new work alongside recent and never-before-seen work. These rates are what we are currently able to pay as of May 2026, and we hope to raise them in future years.

Every Wednesday in August we open the doors at DC Learn for young people and families. Drop in any time between 11am and 3pm, stay as long as you like, and all materials are provided.

We are collaborating on a major project, with Photoworks, BACKLIT and Aspex, exploring queer and feminist photography in response to the archive of artist and activist Tessa Boffin.





