Visual arts
Louise Bourgeois, Scottish National Gallery of Modern ArtFriday, 01 November 2013
There’s a giant spider in the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art’s new exhibition of Louise Bourgeois. Her trademark spider and the fact that she lived to 98 – working into her final days – are probably two of the best-known things about her.... Read more... |
Turner Prize 2013, Ebrington Barracks, Derry-LondonderryWednesday, 30 October 2013
This year, if you don’t live in Ireland, you’ll have to take a plane or a boat to see the Turner Prize exhibition. But the effort will be nicely rewarded, for Derry (or Londonderry/Doire – wherever your affiliations take you) is a beautiful city,... Read more... |
The Male Nude, Wallace CollectionWednesday, 30 October 2013
It is amazing how perceptions and attitudes change. Think of a nude and the chances are you will imagine a naked woman since, nowadays, the female body virtually monopolises the genre; naked men scarcely make an appearance in mainstream culture.... Read more... |
Daumier: Visions of Paris, Royal AcademySunday, 27 October 2013
From Hogarth through to Gillray and Cruikshank, it was Georgian England that gave rise to a graphic tradition of satire. The powerful were lampooned and the pretensions and avarice of the upper and aspiring classes duly ridiculed. But the poor did... Read more... |
Whistler and the Thames: An American in London, Dulwich Picture GallerySunday, 27 October 2013
Dulwich Picture Gallery, the oldest publicly accessible painting collection in England, is hardly on the bank of the Thames, but its compilation of prints, drawings, watercolours and paintings by James McNeill Whistler (1834-1902) concentrates on... Read more... |
Anthony Caro, 1924-2013Thursday, 24 October 2013
Sir Anthony Caro, who died on Wednesday of a heart attack aged 89, was an artist who remained not only active but inventive to the last. In the past year alone he had three major exhibitions: a distilled retrospective at the Museo Correr in Venice (... Read more... |
The Young Dürer: Drawing the Figure, Courtauld GalleryWednesday, 23 October 2013
It surely takes courage to conceive an exhibition around a single, slightly obscure work by an artist whose oeuvre boasts an array of crowd-pleasers. Rather than gathering together the greatest hits, the Courtauld Gallery’s new exhibition takes as... Read more... |
Elizabeth I and Her People, National Portrait GallerySaturday, 19 October 2013
At the beginning of the 17th century an anonymous Anglo-Netherlandish artist produced an elaborate procession portrait of the septuagenarian Virgin Queen, tactfully portrayed as though several decades younger, when she had succeeded to the throne in... Read more... |
Art Under Attack: Histories of British Iconoclasm, Tate BritainFriday, 18 October 2013
Seeing the statue of Saddam Hussein toppled in Baghdad in April 2003, I felt a rush of euphoria despite deep reservations about the American invasion. My (misplaced) optimism was shared by the Iraqi student, Ayass Mohammed. ’“Suddenly I felt freedom... Read more... |
Paul Klee: Making Visible, Tate ModernTuesday, 15 October 2013
"The objects in pictures look out at us serene or severe, tense or relaxed, comforting or forbidding, suffering or smiling." Thus said Paul Klee (1879-1940) in a lecture on modern art in 1924. It is an entirely accurate description of his own work,... Read more... |
Kara Walker, Camden Arts CentreSunday, 13 October 2013
American ladies, in the 18th and 19th centuries, passed their time in fashionable pursuits such as embroidering samplers and cutting out portraits of family and friends. Harking back to those days, Kara Walker has covered three walls of the Camden... Read more... |
Dayanita Singh: Go Away Closer, Hayward GalleryWednesday, 09 October 2013
In the 25 years she has spent taking photographs, Dayanita Singh has accumulated a huge body of evocative and memorable images. For instance, there’s the girl lying face down on a bed (main picture), dressed in what looks like her school uniform.... Read more... |
