Features

The man with the fantastic light machines

With his eccentric inventions, the mid-century artist Thomas Wilfred created a whole new genre of art that left its mark on the likes of James Turrell

20 Nov 2024

Acquisitions of the month: October 2024

A massive bequest of Old Masters and a huge painting of a procession of giants are among the most important works to have entered museum collections recently

19 Nov 2024

At the world’s northernmost medieval cathedral, religious art takes an agnostic turn

A collage series by Håkon Bleken in Nidaros Cathedral meditates on Christian imagery as well as the traumas of Norwegian history

18 Nov 2024

‘As an image of victimhood, Cat in a Crate beats many a crucifixion’

Lucy Ellmann is troubled by an eerily realistic 19th-century painting of a cat behind bars

16 Nov 2024

A new look for Japanese art at the MFA Boston

The museum holds the world’s largest collection of Japanese art outside Japan itself – and now has suitably meditative spaces to match

14 Nov 2024

How Oxford became a pale shade of its former self

The replacement of Boswell’s department store with a luxury hotel is part of a beautification process that has gathered pace in recent years

11 Nov 2024

When it comes to pudding or dessert, what’s in a name?

The language we use to describe the sweet course at the end of a meal is more revealing than we think

9 Nov 2024

The plane crash that made it into a museum

Christian Boltanski’s installation at the Museo per la Memoria di Ustica is a stark tribute to the victims of an unsolved tragedy

6 Nov 2024

The city of Linz is all about the future – but that wasn’t always the case

Given Hitler’s unrealised plans for a museum of looted art in Linz, the futuristic Ars Electronica festival is a triumph for the city, but there’s no room for complacence

30 Oct 2024

How to be buried in style in ancient China

Ching-Ling Wang of the Rijkmuseum explains what we do and don’t know about a bronze Han-dynasty horse and its rider made as a burial offering

28 Oct 2024

A fitting tribute to Dior

An imaginative exhibition in The Hague stresses how much the fashion house still owes to its founder

28 Oct 2024

Inside the mysteries of Van Cleef and Arpels

The jeweller generally reveals precious little about its process, but Apollo gains access to the site in Paris where the magic happens

28 Oct 2024

The French vineyard turning winemaking into a cottage industry

Château Smith Haut Lafitte is a vineyard sprinkled with the sensibility of an English country garden

28 Oct 2024

How to make a new museum in Nigeria

The Museum of West African Art points to a new path for creating an institution from scratch and more imaginative ways of dealing with the colonial past

24 Oct 2024

Making lunch for Lucian Freud

A regular haunt of artists, dealers and curators, Sally Clarke’s restaurant in Kensington has been a beacon of unfussy excellence for 40 years

24 Oct 2024

Acquisitions of the month: September 2024

A 17th-century portrait of a bookseller from Lombardy and a breviary from the library of Charles V are among this month’s highlights

21 Oct 2024

The slippery Surrealism of Pierre Roy

The French artist was largely ignored by his peers, but his uncanny painting of a snake is a masterpiece

15 Oct 2024

How will Paris cope without the Pompidou Centre for five years?

The museum is set to close in 2025, leaving a hole in the city’s arts scene and adding to growing disquiet about its general direction

13 Oct 2024

The warped aesthetics of Lynn Chadwick

The sculptor’s witty animal-like sculptures are dotted around the grounds of his house in the Cotswolds – and they feel right at home there

11 Oct 2024

Frieze week highlights: two shamans and a sage of modern art

Plus: the subversive art of Kapwani Kiwanga, Georgie Hopton’s delightful prints and a brief history of drawing on blue paper

7 Oct 2024

Frieze week highlights: a Japanese printmaking dynasty is feted in Dulwich

Plus: the Sikh Empire under Ranjit Singh, the trailblazing art of Lygia Clark and the serene ceramics of Magdalene Odundo

7 Oct 2024

Frieze week highlights: Pamela Phatsimo Sunstrum gets theatrical at the Barbican

Plus: the light sculptures of Anthony McCall, paintings by Frank Auerbach and his teacher David Bomberg, and Nordic nature scenes

7 Oct 2024

Frieze week highlights: Tracey Emin puts on a visceral display of emotion

Plus: playful sculptures by Nairy Baghramian, revelatory paintings by Van Gogh, and the changing nature of beauty through the ages

7 Oct 2024

Michelangelo Pistoletto’s Arte Povera masterpiece is a case of rags and endless riches

Curator Carolyn Christov-Bakargiev explains how the artist’s Venus of the Rags embodies the innovative spirit of the Italian movement

7 Oct 2024