© Kiki Smith / Courtesy PaceWildenstein, New York
“Untitled,” 1980-92, by Kiki Smith, is part of the “Keeping It Real” show at the Whitechapel Gallery in London.

A new exhibition at the Whitechapel Gallery in London is putting the focus on the actual materials that become art. It’s also giving 60 of the 400 pieces in the impressive Daskalopoulos Collection their first London showing.

The show, titled “Keeping It Real,” runs through May 22, 2011, at the all-star gallery (77-82 Whitechapel High Street; whitechapelgallery.org). Only a few of the works have been on view before, and never so many in one space.

Built up over the past 15 years by Dimitris Daskalopoulos, an Athens-based business entrepreneur, the collection features major contemporary artists, including Matthew Barney, Louise Bourgeois, Damien Hirst, Sherrie Levine and Kiki Smith, as well as those from previous generations, like Marcel Duchamp, Robert Morris and Dieter Roth. Large-scale installations and sculpture figure prominently, but drawing, collage, film and video are also well represented.

“What unites all the works,” said Achim Borchardt-Hume, the Whitechapel’s chief curator, “is how different artists use all the various materials available to them, from wax to mirrors to newspapers to light bulbs. Usually people just focus on how the materials appear once arranged in a work of art; here the materials take center stage.”

The exhibition is arranged into four sections with different themes, each on view in seperate showings. “The Corporeal,” which is showing now through Sept 5, focuses on the body — Duchamp’s famous “Fountain” -– an unadulterated white, ceramic urinal –- is a notable piece (though one that has, of course, been shown before). “Subversive Abstraction,” Sept. 17 to Dec. 5, covers unusual interpretations of abstraction, and includes David Hammons’s ghostly untitled body print. “Current Disturbance,” Dec. 17 to March 6, features an installation by Mona Hatoum, which is accompanied by the sounds of an electric current feeding flashing light bulbs. Lastly, “Material Intelligence,” March 18 to May 22, focuses on works that play with various media, including the body itself. Artists include Seth Price and Kelley Walker.

The gallery is open Tuesday to Wednesday, Friday and Saturday, 11 a.m. to 6 p.m.; Thursday 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. Free admission.