Exhibitions
Recycling the avant-garde
One overcast afternoon in late July I took a train to Norfolk. It seemed a good time and place to…
Beauty and the banal
In 1965 William Eggleston took the first colour photograph that, he felt, really succeeded. The location was outside a supermarket…
Beauty and the banal
In 1965 William Eggleston took the first colour photograph that, he felt, really succeeded. The location was outside a supermarket…
First impressions
The last boat I saw in the galleries on the Mound was a canoe that the Scottish painter Jock McFadyen…
First impressions
The last boat I saw in the galleries on the Mound was a canoe that the Scottish painter Jock McFadyen…
Privates on parade
In 1927, Georgia O’Keeffe announced that she would like her next exhibition to be ‘so magnificently vulgar that all the…
Privates on parade
In 1927, Georgia O’Keeffe announced that she would like her next exhibition to be ‘so magnificently vulgar that all the…
Echoes of Italy
‘Hidden beauty is best (half seen), faces turned away.’ So noted a young English painter named Winifred Knights in 1924.…
Echoes of Italy
‘Hidden beauty is best (half seen), faces turned away.’ So noted a young English painter named Winifred Knights in 1924.…
Jumbled up
‘In the end, nothing goes with anything,’ Lucian Freud remarked one afternoon years ago. ‘It’s your taste that puts things…
Jumbled up
‘In the end, nothing goes with anything,’ Lucian Freud remarked one afternoon years ago. ‘It’s your taste that puts things…
Let’s talk about sex
At one time, Damien Hirst was fond of remarking that art should deal with the Gauguin questions. Namely, ‘Where do…
What lies beneath
It was not so unusual for someone to turn into a god in Egypt. It happened to the Emperor Hadrian’s…
What lies beneath
It was not so unusual for someone to turn into a god in Egypt. It happened to the Emperor Hadrian’s…
Punk turns 40
There have been many punk exhibitions over the years so I can’t help but chuckle at the ‘experts’ who are…
Punk turns 40
There have been many punk exhibitions over the years so I can’t help but chuckle at the ‘experts’ who are…
Close encounters
A story John Piper liked to tell — and the one most told about him — is of a morning…
Close encounters
A story John Piper liked to tell — and the one most told about him — is of a morning…
Surreal, strange and scatological
Why do we put one work of art beside another? For the most part museums and galleries tend to stick…
Surreal, strange and scatological
Why do we put one work of art beside another? For the most part museums and galleries tend to stick…
Wings of desire
Maria Sibylla Merian was a game old bird of entrepreneurial bent, with an overwhelming obsession with insects. Born in Frankfurt…
Wings of desire
Maria Sibylla Merian was a game old bird of entrepreneurial bent, with an overwhelming obsession with insects. Born in Frankfurt…
Is it art or science?
William Henry Fox Talbot had many accomplishments. He was Liberal MP for Chippenham; at Cambridge he won a prize for…
Is it art or science?
William Henry Fox Talbot had many accomplishments. He was Liberal MP for Chippenham; at Cambridge he won a prize for…
Picture books for grown-ups
Art Spiegelman, the American cartoonist behind Maus, the celebrated Holocaust cartoon, dreamt up a good definition of graphic novels: comics…
