visual art
Marlene Dumas at Tate Modern reviewed: 'remarkable'
‘Whoever wishes to devote himself to painting,’ Henri Matisse once advised, ‘should begin by cutting out his own tongue.’ Marlene…
Mohammed — in pictures
Two months ago I was sitting beside the tomb of a descendant of the Prophet Mohammed, telling a story about…
Geometry in the 20th and 21st centuries was adventurous - and apocalyptic
Almost a decade ago, David Cameron informed Tony Blair, unkindly but accurately, ‘You were the future once.’ A visitor to…
The tragic tale of the Two Roberts is a story of two artists cut off in their prime
In 1933, two new students met on their first day at Glasgow School of Art. From then on they were…
2015 in exhibitions - painting still rules
The art on show over the coming year demonstrates that we still live in an age of mighty painters, says Martin Gayford
Climate change, Bruegel-style
The world depicted by the Flemish master is not so different from our own, says Martin Gayford
Snow - art’s biggest challenge
In owning a flock of artificial sheep, Joseph Farquharson must have been unusual among Highland lairds a century ago. His…
The death of the life class
‘Love of the human form’, writes the painter John Lessore, ‘must be the origin of that peculiar concept, the Life…
We must never again let this 19th century Norwegian master slip into oblivion
You won’t have heard of Peder Balke. Yet this long-neglected painter from 19th-century Norway is now the subject of a…
Does Allen Jones deserve a retrospective at the Royal Academy?
It has been a vintage season for mannequins. At the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge, an exhibition called Silent Partners looks…
David Hockney interview: ‘The avant-garde have lost their authority’
David Hockney talks to Martin Gayford about 60 years of ignoring art fashion
Why radio is a surprisingly good medium for talking about art
You might think it a fool’s errand to attempt programmes about art on the wireless. How can you talk about…
Egon Schiele at the Courtauld: a one-note samba of spindly limbs, nipples and pudenda
One day, as a student — or so the story goes — Egon Schiele called on Gustav Klimt, a celebrated…
The pop artist whose transgressions went too far – for the PC art world
After years of being effectively banned from exhibiting in his own country, Allen Jones finally reaches the RA with his first major UK retrospective. Andrew Lambirth meets him
The secret world of the artist's mannequin
A 19th-century London artists’ supplier named Charles Roberson offered imitation human beings for sale or rent, with papier-mâché heads, soft…
Mr Turner: the gruntiest, snortiest, huffiest film of the year - and the most beautiful too
Mr Turner may be the gruntiest film of the year, possibly the gruntiest film ever. ‘Grunt, grunt, grunt,’ goes Mr…
How Rothko become the mythic superman of mystical abstraction
Mark Rothko was an abstract artist who didn’t see himself as an abstract artist — or at least not in…
James Delingpole falls in love with Grayson Perry - and almost comes round to Chris Huhne
I love Grayson Perry. You might almost call him the anti-Russell Brand: a genuinely talented artist who also has some…
Russians made the theatre space the most liberating imaginative device ever invented
You have to hand it to the Russians. They beat us into space, beat us to sexual equality, and a…
All my doubts about Anselm Kiefer are blown away by his Royal Academy show
In the Royal Academy’s courtyard are two large glass cases or vitrines containing model submarines. In one the sea has…
Curator-driven ambitions mar this Constable show at the V&A
The V&A has an unparalleled collection of hundreds of works by John Constable (1776–1837), but hardly anyone seems to know…
'I like vanished things': Anselm Kiefer on art, alchemy and his childhood
Martin Gayford talks to a surprisingly jolly Anselm Kiefer about art and metamorphosis
The man who brought Cubism to New York
The American Jewish artist Max Weber (1881–1961) was born in Belostok in Russia (now Bialystok in Poland), and although he…
How independence will impoverish Scottish culture
Daniel Jackson foresees an impoverished cultural landscape for an independentScotland, with artists forced to do Salmond’s bidding
