theartsdesk com, first with arts reviews, news and interviews
Tom Birchenough
Friday, 14 November 2025
We are bowled over! We knew that theartsdesk.com had plenty of supporters out there – we’ve always had a loyal readership of arts lovers and professionals alike – but the...
Justine Elias
Saturday, 14 June 2025
The opening images of Tornado are striking. A wild-haired young woman in Japanese peasant garb runs for her life through a barren forest and across burnt-orange fields. As her...
Gary Naylor
Saturday, 14 June 2025
The safe transfer of power in post-war Western democracies was once a given. The homely Pickfords Removals van outside Number Ten, a crestfallen now ex-PM and family mooching...
Graham Fuller
Saturday, 14 June 2025
On leaving prison, Lollipop’s thirtyish single mum Molly discovers that reclaiming her kids from social care is akin to doing lengths in a shark-infested swimming pool teeming...
Sarah Kent
Saturday, 14 June 2025
I first came across Rachel Jones in 2021 at the Hayward Gallery’s painting show Mixing it Up: Painting Today. I was blown away by the beauty of her huge oil pastels; rivulets of...
Guy Oddy
Saturday, 14 June 2025
Swiss electro-rockers, Young Gods have been around for 40 years, but this in no way should suggest that they’ve gone soft in their old age. These days, vocalist Franz Treichler...
James Saynor
Friday, 13 June 2025
Do the French do irony? Well, was Astérix a Gaul? Obviously they do, and do it pretty well to judge by many of their movies...
Gary Naylor
Friday, 13 June 2025
There’s an old theatre joke. “The electric chair is too good for a monster like that. They should send him out of town with...
Joe Muggs
Friday, 13 June 2025
When I was writing the introduction to my book, Bass, Mids, Tops: An Oral History of Soundsystem Culture, I came up with a...
Sarah Kent
Thursday, 12 June 2025
It’s been a long time since an exhibition made me feel physically sick. The Hayward Gallery is currently hosting a...
Rachel Halliburton
Thursday, 12 June 2025
For the first encore of the evening, it was not just the audience but the whole ensemble of Hespèrion XXI that was...
Guy Oddy
Thursday, 12 June 2025
When Neil Young releases a new album, you can be reasonably sure that you’ll get either a disc of melancholy singer-...
Jon Turney
Wednesday, 11 June 2025
The slightly overwrought subtitle, "How Digital Language Created and Connects Our World and Shapes Our Future", ...
Kieron Tyler
Wednesday, 11 June 2025
Although Mary Halvorson leads the sextet Amaryllis on About Ghosts, instrumentally, she does not place her guitar to the...
A Midsummer Night's Dream, Bridge Theatre review - Nick Hytner's hit gender-bender returns refreshed
Helen Hawkins
Tuesday, 10 June 2025
It’s a sign of the inroads that the term “immersive” has made in theatreland that it now gets jokily namedropped at the...
Rachel Halliburton
Tuesday, 10 June 2025
This thrilling production of Saul takes Handel’s dramatisation of the Bible’s first Book of Samuel and paints it in pictures...
David Nice
Tuesday, 10 June 2025
If, like me, chamber music isn’t your most frequent home, there are bound to be revelations of what for many are known...
Thomas H Green
Tuesday, 10 June 2025
Marina Diamandis is a proper pop star, brilliantly full-on, off on her own thing. The Welsh singer is primarily known for...
Adam Sweeting
Monday, 09 June 2025
The first series of The Gold in 2023 was received rapturously, though apparently it only told one half of the story of the...
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Thank you for continuing to read our work on theartsdesk.com. For unlimited access to every article in its entirety, including our archive of more than 15,000 pieces, we're asking for £5 per month or £40 per year. We feel it's a very good deal, and hope you do too.
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tv
The Gold, Series 2, BBC One review - back on the trail of the Brink's-Mat bandits
Following the money to the Isle of Man, Spain and the Caribbean
Dept. Q, Netflix review - Danish crime thriller finds a new home in Edinburgh
Matthew Goode stars as antisocial detective Carl Morck
The Rise and Fall of Michelle Mone, BBC Two - boom and bust in the lingerie trade
Life in the fast lane with David Cameron's entrepreneurship tsar
film
Tornado review - samurai swordswoman takes Scotland by storm
East meets West meets North of the Border in a wintry 18th-century actioner
Lollipop review - a family torn apart
Posy Sterling brilliantly conveys the torment of a homeless single mother denied her kids
Jane Austen Wrecked My Life review - persuading us that the French can do you-know-who
An amiable cross-Channel literary rom com
new music
Album: Sam Binga - Sam Binga Presents Club Orthodontics
A thrilling whirlwind tour of bass culture across decades and continents
Album: Neil Young & the Chrome Hearts - Talkin' to the Trees
Musical titan reflects on his life as he careers towards his 80th birthday
classical
Hespèrion XXI, Savall, QEH review - an evening filled with laughter and light
An exhilarating exploration of innovation in 16th and 17th century repertoire
theartsdesk at the Dublin International Chamber Music Festival - musical revelations, nature beyond
Artistic director Ciara Higgins’ programming ensures plenty of surprises
Müller-Schott, RSNO, Søndergård, Usher Hall, Edinburgh - spectacular Shostakovich to end the season
Brilliant orchestral results, while the cellist walks a tightrope in the Second Cello Concerto
opera
Saul, Glyndebourne review - playful, visually ravishing descent into darkness
Ten years after it first opened Barrie Kosky's production still packs a hefty punch
Così fan tutte, Nevill Holt Festival/Opera North review - re-writing the script
Real feeling turns the tables on stage artifice in Mozart that charms, and moves
La Straniera, Chelsea Opera Group, Barlow, Cadogan Hall review - diva power saves minor Bellini
Australian soprano Helena Dix is honoured by fine fellow singers, but not her conductor
theatre
Hamlet Hail to the Thief, RSC, Stratford review - Radiohead mark the Bard's card
An innovative take on a familiar play succeeds far more often than it fails
The King of Pangea, King's Head Theatre review - grief and hope, but no connection
Heart and soul proves insufficient in world premiere of therapeutic show
A Midsummer Night's Dream, Bridge Theatre review - Nick Hytner's hit gender-bender returns refreshed
This Dream is a great night out, especially for Shakespeare first-timers
dance
'We are bowled over!' Thank you for your messages of love and support
Much-appreciated words of commendation from readers and the cultural community
Ballet to Broadway: Wheeldon Works, Royal Ballet review - the impressive range and reach of Christopher Wheeldon's craft
The title says it: as dancemaker, as creative magnet, the man clearly works his socks off
The Forsythe Programme, English National Ballet review - brains, beauty and bravura
Once again the veteran choreographer and maverick William Forsythe raises ENB's game
comedy
'We are bowled over!' Thank you for your messages of love and support
Much-appreciated words of commendation from readers and the cultural community
Dara Ó Briain, Soho Theatre Walthamstow review - master storyteller spins a family yarn
Search for his birth father takes a few turns
Mr Swallow: Show Pony, Richmond Theatre review - magic tricks and mayhem
Nick Mohammed gives his creation's origin story
Books
'We are bowled over!' Thank you for your messages of love and support
Much-appreciated words of commendation from readers and the cultural community
Samuel Arbesman: The Magic of Code review - the spark ages
A wide-eyed take on our digital world can’t quite dispel the dangers
Zsuzsanna Gahse: Mountainish review - seeking refuge
Notes on danger and dialogue in the shadow of the Swiss Alps
visual arts
'We are bowled over!' Thank you for your messages of love and support
Much-appreciated words of commendation from readers and the cultural community
Rachel Jones: Gated Canyons, Dulwich Picture Gallery review - teeth with a real bite
Mouths have never looked so good
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