Modernism
He’s got rhythm
One evening before the first world war, Henri Gaudier-Brzeska, fired by drink, tried out such then-fashionable dances as the cakewalk…
Light fantastic
The most unusual picture in the exhibition of work by Eric Ravilious at Dulwich Picture Gallery, in terms of subject-matter…
High life
End of season is always bittersweet, the melting snows a bit like autumn leaves. But the days are longer and…
Back to the future
Almost a decade ago, David Cameron informed Tony Blair, unkindly but accurately, ‘You were the future once.’ A visitor to…
Chorus of approval
One of the growth areas of contemporary music is in setting sacred texts. It might be thought that I had…
A Cubist in New York
The American Jewish artist Max Weber (1881–1961) was born in Belostok in Russia (now Bialystok in Poland), and although he…
In the gutter, looking at the stars
What he really wanted, Picasso once remarked, was to live ‘like a pauper, but with plenty of money’. It sounds…
New ways to open a bottle
Chefs have a problem. Think of much of the best food you have ever eaten. Caviar, English native oysters, sashimi,…
Man of steel and glass
Modern Architecture, capitalised thus, is now securely and uncontroversially compartmentalised into art history, its bombast muted, its hard-edge revolutions blurred…
Cubism domesticated
Over the past 45 years, there have been two distinct and divergent approaches to Art Deco. One of them —…
Diary
Hay-making was easy this year, and over in good time for a holiday. I am opposed to holidays, having worked…
