Archive

  • Gehry Triumphant

    Above the Basque town of Elciego, Frank Gehry has hit the heavens again. This time, his proposed new hotel for Rioja, the winemakers, is a masterly symphony of movement and mystique. One-third of the budget is funded by the Basque…

  • In Bilbao, che serra, serra …

    The new installation by Richard Serra in Frank Gehry’s Guggenheim (yes, inside it) does go to show, at last, that the museum is actually matching the quality of the architecture with modern masterpieces. There could be no greater sculptural/spatial union…

  • John Bellany at 59

    On l8th June painter John Bellany celebrated his 59th birthday. That Bellany is still alive is little short of miraculous, the result of a remarkable liver transplant at Addenbrooke’s Hospital, Cambridge, in l988. So Bellany is the first living painter…

  • Saving Bellany

    As reported earlier here, the artist John Bellany had a close brush with death earlier this summer. Now, he has shown special gratitude to the doctors, nurses and members of the public who ensured his survival from a debilitating heart…

  • Finland: Modern Architectures in History – book review

    The awakening of Modernism in the 1880s in Finland, as in other European nations, was first felt through the visual arts and literature, manifested (post-Charles Darwin) as a growth in interest in Naturalism and the perceived effects of an increasingly…

  • Frida Kahlo

    Tate Modern, London 9 June – 9 October 2005

  • Visit Britain for a visual feast

    Tate Britain showed ‘A Picture of Britain’ through until 4 September. This picturesque visiting of well-trodden scenarios of the English, Scottish and Welsh landscape exploited the device of picture linkage ostensibly in order to promote such resources of national beauty…

  • Glossing the Czar

    The exhibition on the last Tsar Nicolas and Tsarina Alexandra at the Royal Museum of Scotland draws out but fails to expunge the aura of tragedy that hangs over their reign, terminated by the execution of an entire family. Nicolas…

  • Modes en Miroir: la France et la Hollande au temps des Lumieres

    Musée Galliera, Paris 28 April – 21 August 2005 After the recent decision of the Musée Galliera to collaborate with other European museums and collectors, ‘Modes en Miroir’ continues the theme of contemporary Europe sharing stories of a mutual past:…

  • A new building for St Catz

    Walking around Oxford today, it is remarkable how little the centre of the city has changed in the last 50 years. The sweeping curve of The High, punctuated by the single tree in the garden of All Souls College, remains…

  • Robert Mallet-Stevens

    Centre Pompidou, Paris 27 April–29 August 2005

  • Big Bang: Creation and Destruction in 20th Century Art

    The Pompidou Centre, Paris 15 June 2005-27 February 2006

  • Arte Povera

    At the Castello di Rivola, Turin, it is currently possible to see a celebration of Arte Povera well before it reaches Tate Modern in just over two months’ time. Entitled ‘Zero to Infinity: Arte Povera l962–l972’, this exhibition has all…

  • The Elegance of Silence: Contemporary Art from East Asia

    Mori Art Museum, Tokyo 29 March – 19 June 2005

  • Coming Home! Self-Taught Artists, the Bible, and the American South

    Museum of Biblical Art (MOBIA) May 12 – July 24 2005 ‘Coming Home!’ showcases 95 paintings, sculptures, wood carvings and assemblages by 73 self-taught artists from the American South who, despite their lack of training and formal materials, creatively and…

  • Turner Prize Upcoming

    The prize will be awarded on 5 December and there is already a marked shift in the style of art that is fancied by the glitterati who will take part in the selection process. Is this an acknowledgment of a…

  • Sycophantic Toady

    Three cheers for Brian Sewell who, in the Evening Standard of 20 May 2005, used the above expression to put a lid on the obsequious Sir Joshua Reynolds. In the first years of the 20th century, the collapsed market in…

  • Kahlo: The Enigma of Lost Times

    The most bewildering aspect of this new exhibition featuring the work of Mexican artist, Frida Kahlo (1907-l954), is that of lost time. Partly, this is caused by the slowness of the cataloguing of her effects, comprising 25,000 letters and 180…

  • John Bellany

    John Bellany Whether in his adopted Italian village of Barga in Northern Tuscany, in the hamlet of Garfagna nearby where he actually has his home, or in Cambridge or Edinburgh, where his many friends and admirers hang out, the news…

  • Hop, Skip and Jump in the Art Markets

  • Eduardo Vale

    The death of Sir Eduardo Paolozzi was not a surprise: the survival of his massive physique defeated all prognostications as he continued in a cognitive, silent, almost robotic mode for months following his initial stroke. And yet, it seemed he…

  • Basquiat, Brooklyn Museum, New York

    On 11 March 2005, the Brooklyn Museum in New York opened its ‘Basquiat’ exhibition. Located in the Morris A and Meyer Schapiro wing on the fourth and fifth floors of the museum, the exhibit includes more than 100 works dating…

  • The World is a Stage: Stories Behind Pictures

    Mori Art Museum, Tokyo 29 March – 19 June 2005

  • A Century of Ceramics: A Selection of 20th Century Potters and Potteries in the Isle of Wight

    Lisa and Andrew Dowden, Robin Goodredge. London: 2005 £28, ISBN 0-9548745-1-X This is an exceptional example, in the realm of crafts, of a small island community seizing the initiative to promote their home-grown potteries industry through a publication. This has…