Visual Arts Galleries

Photographic Gallery: Grace Jones Portraits by Chris Levine

Josh Spero Friday, 30 April 2010

One can hardly imagine the spiky dervish Grace Jones sitting still for a second, let alone remaining motionless long enough to have photographs (and plenty of them) taken for her portrait. Nevertheless, Chris Levine has managed to pin her down - in a manner of speaking.

Design Gallery: The Art Nouveau Dacha

Ismene Brown Saturday, 27 March 2010

Vladimir Story's 1917 brochure for patterns for building Russia's traditional wooden country houses - called dachas - has been rescued from oblivion by the chance discovery of an ancient copy of it in Georgia. Now reprinted, The Art Nouveau Dacha: designs by Vladimir Story reveals with marvellous detail a unique house-building tradition full of details and requirements that are as modern nearly a century later....

Art Gallery: Sarnath Banerjee

ASH Smyth Saturday, 13 March 2010

The subversive artist and film-maker Sarnath Banerjee, credited with introducing the graphic novel to India, features in a London show, Royale With Cheese, at Aicon Gallery, 8 Heddon Street, London W1, where his eight-scene graphic narrative Che in Africa is displayed. You can see it here. And read the interview with him here: "I’m very interested in the...

Photographic Gallery: John Angerson's English Journey

Jasper Rees Monday, 08 March 2010

Anna Baranovska, single mother, Birmingham. Originally from Lativa, she was shortlisted for Miss England

“Being a rambling but truthful account of what one man saw and heard and felt and thought during a journey through England.” Upon its publication 75 years ago, J B Priestley’s English Journey became an important influence for writers, photographers and even, it has been suggested, the agenda of the post-war Labour administration. Cushioned by the success of The Good Companions (1929), Priestley embarked on his tour of the English regions at a time of economic Armageddon. In...

Art Gallery: Henry Moore's Reclining Figures

Mark Hudson Wednesday, 03 March 2010

Henry Moore is said to have first encountered the image of the reclining figure in Paris in 1925 in a plaster cast of an ancient Mexican Toltec-Maya figure in the Trocadero Museum. It was to become probably his most frequently explored theme, revisited hundreds of times over the following 60 years before his death in 1986. From the relatively realistic to the almost totally abstract, Moore’s reclining figures can be seen in galleries and public spaces all over the world.

Photographic Gallery: Gavin Bond, Idea Generation Gallery

Jasper Rees Tuesday, 16 February 2010

Over the past couple of years, maverick photographer Gavin Bond has built up a contacts book that would be the envy of Rankin or Annie Leibovitz. He’s been shooting everyone who is anyone: subjects range from godfathers of rock such as Bono and AC/DC, through familiar acts like The Killers and Gwen Stefani, to fresh faces and emerging starts like Katy Perry and Vampire Weekend.

Art Gallery: Afro Modern, Tate Liverpool

Mark Hudson Friday, 05 February 2010

Keith Piper: Go West Young Man, 1987. Photograph on paper mounted on board. In 14 parts

Afro Modern: Journeys through the Black Atlantic is without doubt one of the year’s most enterprising and original exhibitions. Attempting to trace the impact on art of black cultures from around the Atlantic – in Africa, Europe and the Americas – from the early 20th century to today, it takes on a massive swathe of culture and experience. Or perhaps that should be several massive swathes.

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Photographic Gallery: Niall O'Brien, Art Work Space

Jasper Rees Monday, 01 February 2010

'Xavier', from Niall O'Brien's 'Good Rats' exhibition

Purists would have it that punk rock was but a brief explosion in first New York then London, and was all but spent by the end of 1977. Irish photographer Niall O'Brien, however, was born in 1979 and has no truck with purism. Instead, taking the role of anthropologist for his exhibition Good Rats, he has befriended and spent time with groups of young punks, from skaters in Kingston-upon-Thames to homeless teens in Berlin and Tel Aviv, and documented the noise, chaos and sense of...

Photographic Gallery: Sony World Photography Awards

theartsdesk Wednesday, 20 January 2010

Wojciech Grzedzinski: 'Georgian woman cries after Russian air strike on civilian buildings in Gori'. Winner, Current Affairs category

The annual Sony World Photography Awards began in 2007. They showcase the work of both professional and amateur photographers across genres which inclu de journalism, fashion, architecture, advertising, sport and music. This year there were over 60,000 images submitted from 139 countries. Each year, the winners and runners-up are collected in an exhibition which tours the world. The London stop of the tour opens today at the...

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Art Gallery: Medieval and Renaissance Galleries, V&A

Jasper Rees Friday, 11 December 2009

Detail of the War of Troy tapestry, woven in wool and silk, Tournai, France (1475-1490)

After the opening earlier this autumn of the reconfigured Ceramic Galleries, the Victoria & Albert Museum's renovation continues. Here is a selection of exhibits on permanent display in the newly reopened Medieval and Renaissance Galleries - Fisun Güner reviews the display elsewhere in theartsdesk.