Arts feature
Best in show
Martin Gayford recommends the exhibitions to see — and to avoid — over the coming year
Best in show
Until a decade and a half ago, we had no national museum of modern art at all. Indeed, the stuff…
Why would a dissolute rebel like Paul Gauguin paint a nativity?
Martin Gayford investigates how this splendid Tahitian Madonna came about and why religion was ever-present in Gauguin's art
The art of Beatrix Potter
Her best illustrations — limpid, ethereal, carefully observed — are masterly works of art in their own right, argues Matthew Dennison
The art of Beatrix Potter
‘I will do something sooner or later,’ wrote Beatrix Potter in the secret diary she kept in a private code.…
Why would a dissolute rebel like Paul Gauguin paint a nativity?
A young Polynesian woman lies outstretched on sheets of a soft lemon yellow. She is wrapped in deep blue cloth,…
New word order
Peter Robins reports from Nottingham on a unique adaptation of a novel by the literary innovator B.S. Johnson
New word order
In the basement of a busy café in Hockley, Nottingham, which may not have known exactly what it was letting…
The bicycle may have triumphed but it’s far from perfect
The bicycle may have triumphed over the car but it’s far from perfect, argues Stephen Bayley
The bicycle may have triumphed but it’s far from perfect
It’s extraordinary that it took civilisation so very long to discover the benefits of putting little wheels on suitcases. We…
Artificial life
Ruskin dismissed Julia Margaret Cameron’s photographs as untrue. But, argues Martin Gayford, the same could be said of any picture
Artificial life
One day Julia Margaret Cameron was showing John Ruskin a portfolio of her photographic portraits. The critic grew more and…
How Technicolor came to dominate cinema
Peter Hoskin celebrates Technicolor’s 100th birthday
How Technicolor came to dominate cinema
They’ve already found a cure for the common cold. It’s called Technicolor. My first dose of it came during the…
Theatre and transgression in Europe’s last dictatorship
Juan Holzmann goes underground in Minsk with the Belarus Free Theatre
Theatre and transgression in Europe’s last dictatorship
In a drab residential street in foggy, damp Minsk, four students are at work in a squat white building that…
Of gods and men
Over the stupefyingly long course of Egyptian history, gods have been born and they have died. Some 4,000 years ago,…
Of gods and men
Tom Holland on Egypt, where the deities were born and history itself began
Colm Tóibín on priests, loss and the half-said thing
Jenny McCartney talks to unstoppable literary force Colm Tóibín about loss, priests and half-said things
Colm Tóibín on priests, loss and the half-said thing
‘No matter what I’m writing,’ says Colm Tóibín, ‘someone ends up getting abandoned. Or someone goes. No matter what I’m…
What is it about Bill Viola’s films that reduce grown-ups to tears?
What is it about Bill Viola's films that reduce grown-ups to tears? William Cook dries his eyes and talks to the video artist about Zen, loss and nearly drowning
What is it about Bill Viola’s films that reduce grown-ups to tears?
Even the most down-to-earth people get emotional about Bill Viola’s videos. Clare Lilley of Yorkshire Sculpture Park (YSP) seems close…
Why I’m stepping down after 28 years as The Spectator pop critic
Pop's place in culture has changed drastically. Marcus Berkmann explains why, after 27 years, it is time to step down as The Spectator's pop critic
Why I’m stepping down after 28 years as The Spectator pop critic
This is my 345th and last monthly column about pop music for The Spectator. I believe I might be the…
Hitler’s émigrés
German-speaking refugees dragged British culture into the 20th century. But that didn’t go down well in Stepney or Stevenage, says William Cook
