Reviews

The Scottish artist who liked to be beside the seaside

The seaside scenes of Willie Rodger aren’t necessarily a sunny affair, but they are always full of life

20 May 2022

‘An elegy to a disappearing planet’ – Katie Paterson in Edinburgh, reviewed

Over the course of an almost a decade, the Scottish artist has gathered and crushed ancient geological specimens to create a work of real conceptual power

5 May 2022
From ‘I have found a light in the darkness’ by Julia Soboleva (Witty Books)

The strange and sinister world of Julia Soboleva

The Latvian-born artist takes found photographs and paints over them to make enigmatic and eerie images – but they’re not meant to be scary, she insists

29 Apr 2022

‘A curatorial masterclass’ – the 59th Venice Biennale, reviewed

Cecilia Alemani’s focus on women artists goes beyond tokenism to present a strong statement about both contemporary art and the world we live in

29 Apr 2022
View of the Colosseum (c. 1550), by Hieronymus Cock, after the circle of Domenico Ghirlandaio. Sir John Soane’s Museum, London

The Soane Museum provides a masterclass in the art of architectural drawing

Frances Sands’ selection from one of the world’s greatest collections of architectural drawings will delight both experts and the general reader alike

28 Apr 2022

The restless spirit of Stephen Shore

In this memoir of sorts, the photographer gives us a masterclass in staying alert and fully alive to the everyday world

28 Apr 2022

The fine lines of Franz Kafka

The writer’s drawings are every bit as fastidious as his sentences – and full of the same preoccupations

When clothes really do make the man – ‘Fashioning Masculinities’ at the V&A, reviewed

Throughout the ages, and for better or worse, the clothes men have worn have been absolutely crucial, writes Rosalind Jana

28 Apr 2022

The painter who turned his eye upon the crowds of Paris

Louis-Léopold Boilly experienced his fair share of personal drama, but he had a rare gift for depicting the ins and outs of everyday existence

28 Apr 2022
David

Details man – Donatello in Florence, reviewed

The sculptor’s boundless powers of invention are on full display in his hometown for this once-in-a-lifetime blockbuster

28 Apr 2022

Making progress in postwar Britain

This focused survey shows that artists after the war seemed more than ready to embrace the future

28 Apr 2022

Mary Weatherford takes on Titian in his hometown

The Californian painter’s responses to ‘The Flaying of Marsyas’ have a sublime quality all of its own

26 Apr 2022
Le Parc des Sources, Vichy (1970), David Hockney.

David Hockney sees through it all at the Fitzwilliam

The painter may be fond of his iPad, but his longstanding suspicion of the technologies that have tied artists to linear perspective is to the fore here

15 Apr 2022
Vase with the head of an elephant (1757), designed by Jean Claude Chambellan Duplessis the Elder and painted by Charles-Nicolas Dodin for Sèvres. The Wallace Collection, London

The rococo interiors that furnished Walt Disney’s imagination

The French furniture that inspired the look of Disney’s best-loved films also came out of a studio system that required a good deal of collaboration

15 Apr 2022
The Skiiers by Akseli Gallen-Kallela

The Finnish painter who longed for freedom

Akseli Gallen-Kallela is best-known for his pretty lakeside views, but he also yearned for political independence and spiritual fulfilment

13 Apr 2022
Daddy: A Melodrama

Power play — ‘“Daddy”: A Melodrama’ at the Almeida, reviewed

Jeremy O. Harris’ latest play unravels the twisted power dynamics between a wealthy white art collector and an emerging Black artist on a Hockney-inspired stage

8 Apr 2022
Allies (1995), Lawrence Holofcener.

Why are so many public statues so disappointing?

The most successful public statues are more than mere three-dimensional versions of photographs plonked on plinths

5 Apr 2022
Bacon in Moscow

Spying an opportunity – how Francis Bacon made it to Moscow

James Birch recounts the improbable story of how, with help from the KGB, he put on a show of Bacon’s work in the Soviet Union

5 Apr 2022
Coffee service for Alice Belin du Pont (designed 1910–11), Tiffany and Company. Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven

Gilt complex – ‘Gold in America’ at Yale University Art Gallery, reviewed

The gold objects in this show may glitter, but some of their previous owners are cast in a far from flattering light

5 Apr 2022
Nude Self Portrait (c. 1915; detail), Florine Stettheimer. Avery Architectural & Fine Arts Library, Columbia University, New York

The thoroughly modern scenes of Florine Stettheimer

The painter who was at the heart of the New York avant-garde captured the many excitements of the modern age

5 Apr 2022
Einder (Horizon) Marlene Dumas

Full frontal flatness – Marlene Dumas in Venice, reviewed

The South African artist’s exposing paintings are not merely portraits of bare flesh – they are revelations of humanity’s darker, more painful depths

1 Apr 2022
Detail of a print depicting a raven by John James Audubon.

Lord of the wings – how Audubon’s career got off to a flying start

James John Audubon’s illustrations of birds endure to this day, even if many of the species he depicted didn’t make it

1 Apr 2022
Howard Carter photographed with the golden sarcophagus of Tutankhamun in 1922 by Harry Burton (colourised version).

Golden boy – the timeless appeal of Tutankhamun

A century after the discovery of his tomb, our interest in the teenage pharaoh says more about the present than the past

1 Apr 2022
Yves Saint Laurent’s Mondrian dress (Autumn-Winter 1965), displayed next to Piet Mondrian’s Composition en rouge, bleu et blanc (1937).

‘A six-gun salute to the bespectacled one’ – Yves Saint Laurent in Paris, reviewed

The designer’s infatuation with the fine arts ran deep, as a series of exhibitions throughout the city’s museums makes clear

24 Mar 2022