Couldn’t artists let one read when sitting for them?
The 20th-century painter Balthus once suggested that the author of a book about him began with the words: ‘Balthus is…
In the 1960s the brightest star of British art was Richard Smith – and you can see why
It is easy to assume that the contours of art history are unchanging, its major landmarks fixed for ever. Actually,…
Lorenzo Lotto’s 16th century portraits come startlingly close to photography
You can, perhaps, glimpse Lorenzo Lotto himself in the National Gallery’s marvellous exhibition, Lorenzo Lotto: Portraits. At the base of…
Like today’s conceptual artists, Burne-Jones was more interested in ideas than paint
‘I want big things to do and vast spaces,’ Edward Burne-Jones wrote to his wife Georgiana in the 1870s. ‘And…
Wonderful, overwhelming, once-in-a-lifetime display of Bruegels – get on a plane now
‘About suffering’, W.H. Auden memorably argued in his poem ‘Musée des Beaux Arts’, the old masters ‘were never wrong’. Great…
Full of fabulous, but baffling, things: Oceania reviewed
At six in the morning of 20 July 1888, Robert Louis Stevenson first set eyes on a Pacific Island. As…
There’s almost nothing in this Hayward show – and that’s the point
A reflection on still water was perhaps the first picture that Homo sapiens ever encountered. The importance of mirrors in…
The Spanish artist who is more gruesome even than Caravaggio
Last year my wife and I were wandering around the backstreets of Salamanca when we were confronted by a minor…
A historical whodunnit that lets you into a forgotten world: The Paston Treasure reviewed
In 1675 Lady Bedingfield wrote to Robert Paston, first Earl of Yarmouth. Never, she exclaimed, had she seen anything so…
Caricature, satire and over-the-top horror: Magic Realism at Tate Modern reviewed
‘It is disastrous to name ourselves!’ So Willem de Kooning responded when some of his New York painter buddies elected…
Modernist architecture only worked for the wealthy
It was Le Corbusier who famously wrote that ‘A house is a machine for living in’ (‘Une maison est une…
If you like monstrosities, head to the Hayward Gallery
One area of life in which globalism certainly rules is that of contemporary art. Installation, performance, the doctrine of Marcel…
Appealingly meaningless and improbable: Christo at the Serpentine Lake reviewed Plus: memorably pointless paintings at the Serpentine Sackler Gallery
It’s not a wrap. This is the first thing to note about the huge trapezoid thing that has appeared, apparently…
How good a painter was Frida Kahlo?
In 2004 Mexican art historians made a sensational discovery in Frida Kahlo’s bathroom. Inside this space, sealed since the 1950s,…
Sorrow and pity are no guarantee of artistic success: Aftermath at Tate Britain reviewed
Some disasters could not occur in this age of instant communication. The first world war is a case in point:…
Edward Bawden is deservedly one of Britain’s most popular 20th century artists
‘When I’m on good form,’ Edward Bawden told me, ‘I get to some point in the design and I laugh…
How lucky we are to have the Royal Academy
What is the Royal Academy? This question set me thinking as I wandered through the crowds that celebrated the opening…
India’s Sistine ceiling
In Tamil Nadu we found that we were exotic. Although there were some other western tourists around, in most of…
The artist more fond of flowers and vegetables than people – and who can blame him
I have occasionally mused that there is plenty of scope for a Tate East Anglia — a pendant on the…
Why it’s bad for potters to think of themselves as artists
A friend of mine once owned a vase by the potter Hans Coper — until, that is, her teenage son…
The codes and codswallop surrounding Leonardo da Vinci
‘If you look at walls soiled with a variety of stains or at stones with variegated patterns,’ Leonardo da Vinci…
The public are quite right to love Monet
Think of the work of Claude Monet and water lilies come to mind, so do reflections in rippling rivers, and…
Once seen as the coming force in British painting, John Craxton deserves another look
In late April 1992, I was in Crete, interviewing the painter John Craxton. It was the week that Francis Bacon…
Intelligent, poetic and profound: Tacita Dean at the National and National Portrait galleries
Andy Warhol would probably have been surprised to learn that his 1964 film ‘Empire’ had given rise to an entire…
Surreal jokes and juicy strokes: Martin Gayford on the power of paint
René Magritte was fond of jokes. There are several in René Magritte (Or: The Rule of Metaphor), a small but…
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