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Fifty years of The Velvet Underground

It tanked in 1967, but the band’s debut album, produced by Andy Warhol, was still the best pop cultural achievement of its decade

4 May 2017
Portraits of Christophe Plantin (1616) and Jan I Moretus (1613/16) by Peter Paul Rubens, Plantin-Moretus Museum, Antwerp

‘A good business, like a family, needs a myth’

For 300 years, the Plantin-Moretus family in Antwerp ran one of Europe’s most important printing presses

3 May 2017
The Israel Museum, Jerusalem

Why the Israel Museum is searching for a new director… again

Weeks after Eran Neuman took up the directorship, he left. What’s going on at the Israel Museum?

1 May 2017

Boris, you owe us £37 million

The Garden Bridge Trust should be pursued for the public money it has wasted

29 Apr 2017
French presidential election candidate of the far-right Front National (FN) party Marine Le Pen visits a private museum in the castle of Jaunay-Clan on 3 April, 2017. GUILLAUME SOUVANT/AFP/Getty Images

French culture: a presidential battleground

Where do the two remaining French presidential candidates stand on culture?

28 Apr 2017
Percussion shotgun (dated 1862), made by LePage Moutier for the 1862 International Exhibition in South Kensington. From the W. Keith Neal collection. © Royal Armouries

Collecting historic firearms in the 21st century

Where is the line between antique firearms suitable for inclusion in historic collections, and weapons requiring a licence?

27 Apr 2017
The displays in the Museum of Islamic Art were redesigned by Adrien Gardère in 2010, Photo: B.O'Kane/Alamy Stock Photo

How Islamic is Cairo’s Museum of Islamic art?

The definition of ‘Islamic’ at Cairo’s Museum of Islamic Art lacks nuance, but so do our wider conversations about Islam

24 Apr 2017
No. 1 Poultry, London, designed by James Stirling Michael Wilford Associates and completed in 1998.

The Battle of No. 1 Poultry

No. 1 Poultry is now Britain’s youngest listed building, but it was once the site of a remarkable struggle between the developer and conservationists

24 Apr 2017

Do museum directors need curatorial experience?

It takes all manner of skills and qualities to run a top institution – or at least to do it well.

24 Apr 2017
Glassmasters working on Pieke Bergman's piece for 'Glasstress 2009'. Courtesy of Fondazione Berengo

Venice must keep its Murano glass industry intact

The future of the historic craft will only be secure if contemporary artists and audiences understand it better

24 Apr 2017
Dance Mask (detail; c. 1900), unrecorded artist, Yup'ik, Alaska. Promised gift of Charles and Valerie Diker. Photo: Dirk Bakker

Native American art hasn’t changed, but museums have

The Metropolitan Museum is finally showing Native art in its American galleries. This is important, but only as a reflection on museums themselves

21 Apr 2017
Painted Hall Ceiling Tours. © ORNC

Is accessible conservation more than a PR trick?

How sceptical should we be of the move towards a more transparent approach to cultural heritage?

3 Apr 2017

Jesus’s tomb has been restored in Jerusalem

One of the holiest sites in Christianity has reopened in time for Easter

28 Mar 2017

The art world must do more to support experts

Now is the moment for those who lament the passing of connoisseurship to work together to encourage its revival

27 Mar 2017
Illustration by Anja Sušanj/Dutch Uncle

Is Documenta exploiting the economic crisis in Athens?

This year Documenta will be split between Kassel and Athens. Is this ‘crisis tourism’ or will it spotlight the city’s overlooked contemporary art scene?

27 Mar 2017

Digital replicas are not soulless – they help us engage with art

Rather than seeing replicas as knock-offs, we should think of them like maps or models

23 Mar 2017
Egyptian workers pose next to an excavated statue, recently discovered by a team of German-Egyptian archeologists, in Cairo's Mattarya district on March 13, 2017.

Can a long-lost Egyptian colossus save ancient Heliopolis?

A huge Egyptian statue has been unearthed in a Cairo suburb. Will the global attention it has received lead to further discoveries at the neglected site?

21 Mar 2017

Is museum security robust enough to counter crime and terrorism?

Cultural sites have been targeted by criminals and terrorists in recent years. How are they responding to the changing contemporary threat?

16 Mar 2017

Banksy’s new art hotel offers rooms with a view

Is the street artist’s hotel in Palestine a tourist-led gimmick or a strong political statement?

15 Mar 2017

Blame games at the Met

As events at the Met show, it’s all too easy to forget that trustees are as responsible as directors for the museums they run

10 Mar 2017
Christie’s in South Kensington in 2005.

Something has gone very wrong at Christie’s

The auction house’s decision to close its South Kensington saleroom and scale back operations in Amsterdam smacks of corporate short-termism

9 Mar 2017
TEFAF Maastricht: now coming to you in June. Photo: Loraine Bodewes, courtesy of TEFAF 2015

We can all learn from the Dutch art world

TEFAF Maastricht turns 30 this year, and Dutch museums are going from strength to strength. What’s behind their extraordinary success?

27 Feb 2017

Is the Bilbao effect over?

How has the Guggenheim Bilbao changed the city in the 20 years since it opened – and should other cities still try to copy its example?

27 Feb 2017
Stonehenge and the A303. Pam Brophy

Why are England’s heritage bodies supporting the Stonehenge Bypass?

Historic England, English Heritage and the National Trust have so far failed to address the flaws in Highways England’s plan to tunnel under the ancient site

24 Feb 2017