Reviews

Restoration, Villa Borghese by Milton Gendel

The American who conquered cafe society in Rome

For seven decades, Milton Gendel recorded his charmed existence in delightfully candid photos and diaries

28 Nov 2022

The triumph of the Tudors

Other European dynasties of the period had equally thriving court cultures, but none has had such a hold on the popular imagination

28 Nov 2022
Alf and the Canary (Brown Ale) by Ruskin Spear

The unfashionable art of Ruskin Spear

Tanya Harrod’s biography of the unfairly neglected painter champions his scenes of London working-class life

28 Nov 2022
Magdalena Abakanowicz

The soft resistance of Magdalena Abakanowicz’s woven sculptures

The Polish artist sometimes worked at a monumental scale, but her most impressive works are less about the size than the power of their expression

27 Nov 2022

Mimic men – how artists have spurred each other to new heights

An illuminating exhibition in Vienna explores how artists from the Greeks on have revelled in rivalries

24 Nov 2022

The film-maker exploring Nigeria’s hangover from colonial rule

Ayo Akingbade’s new short film, set in the first Guinness factory to be built outside of the UK and Ireland, reveals a troubling story of labour and power

23 Nov 2022
Portrait of the artist Denis Wirth-Miller

The British painter who was bullied into obscurity

Denis Wirth-Miller was unfairly dismissed as an imitator of his friend Francis Bacon, but it’s now clear that his detractors were wholly in the wrong

17 Nov 2022
Detail of a screenshot from ‘Pentiment’, by Obsidian. Photo: Xbox Game Studios

Mobs, murder and manuscripts – why ‘Pentiment’ is a must-play for art historians

In Obsidian’s new video game, you are a 16th-century Bavarian painter – but progress on your masterpiece is interrupted by parochial violence

15 Nov 2022
What It Is (detail; 1978–82), Nellie Mae Rowe. Photo: High Museum of Art, Atlanta; © 2022 Estate of Nellie Mae Rowe/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.

The really radical work of Nellie Mae Rowe

Having spent most her life serving others, Nellie Mae Rowe came to art in her retirement years and found a joyful defiance in the creation of other-worldly scenes

10 Nov 2022
Nude (detail; c. 1962), Roger Hilton.

How Roger Hilton played fast and loose with the human form

The St Ives painter best known for his abstract works also created his own kind of figurative art

4 Nov 2022
The Debutante (detail; 1807), Henry Fuseli.

The fetishistic side of Henry Fuseli

The artist’s drawings of women are a testament to his private proclivities. It’s no wonder he never put them on public display

4 Nov 2022
Punto a fogliamo (leafpoint) lace reworked as a collar

On point – the wearing of lace has always been tied up with social status

Lace-making is an exacting craft – and who gets to wear the results is an equally delicate matter

31 Oct 2022

The uncanny resonance of Hannah Starkey’s portraits

The photographer refers to all the women she photographs as icons, but it is in her home town of Belfast where her subjects truly come alive

28 Oct 2022
Hammock Helen Saunders

The Vorticist who was nearly painted out of history

Helen Saunders was briefly at the forefront of British modernism – before she was cancelled by Wyndham Lewis

27 Oct 2022

The Lithuanian painter who thought art could move heaven and earth

A survey of paintings by M.K. Čiurlionis at the Dulwich makes plain why the artist is heralded in his home country as a visionary

27 Oct 2022
The Empress Eugénie (detail).

Committed to memory – how the Empress Eugénie kept the spirit of the Second Empire alive

Exiled in England, Napoleon III’s widow made sure that for as long she lived there was a corner of Hampshire that was forever France

24 Oct 2022

Wolfgang Tillmans has the time of his life at MoMA

The photographer’s seething retrospective at MoMA captures what it was like to be young and carefree after the fall of the Berlin Wall

24 Oct 2022
Andrea Odoni (1527), Lorenzo Lotto. Royal Collection Trust.

Lorenzo Lotto finds a winning streak

Long undervalued in comparison to his peers, the Renaissance painter now has the critical esteem he deserves in the form of a fine catalogue

24 Oct 2022

The forgotten British modernist who hid her paintings under a bed

A new book does justice to the life and work of the little-known artist Suzanne Cooper

24 Oct 2022
De como não foi ministro d’estado (film still; 2012), William Kentridge.

The instant appeal of William Kentridge’s slow art

A journey through four decades of the South African artist’s works reveals the steady evolution of his talent

24 Oct 2022
Heather Phillipson Turner Prize

The Turner Prize plays it safe this year

The four nominees for this year’s prize are presenting their biggest, brightest work but not all of it is saying very much

20 Oct 2022
Jusepe de Ribera

Wilton House may be famous for its sculpture, but its paintings are just as worthwhile

The paintings acquired by the earls of Pembroke over several generations now have the catalogue they deserve

20 Oct 2022
Camille Lenain

How to be queer in the Arab world

Artists from across North Africa and the Middle East are expressing themselves in a sprawling show at the Institut du Monde Arabe

16 Oct 2022
La Condition Humaine (detail; 1935), René Magritte.

At Nottingham Contemporary, caves really are the rocks of ages

A show about caves and the artists who have been inspired by them goes deep underground and incredibly far back in time

30 Sep 2022