Features

In Lausanne, a lively new museum district has finally arrived

The Plateforme 10 project has brought the city’s fine arts, design and photo museums together on the site of a former train yard

28 Mar 2023
Restaurant dining room with views over the City of London

Supper in the City at the Barbican Brasserie

The arts centre’s new restaurant is not exactly a feast for the eyes, but the food more than makes up for it

28 Mar 2023

James Joyce walks into a bar in Zurich

At the Kronenhalle in Zurich, the writer was most likely to ask for Fendant de Sion, a wine that deserves to be much better known abroad

28 Mar 2023
detail of a rug

Fine carpets from Asia are definitely back in fashion

After a spell in the doldrums, prices for magnificent carpets from across the continent are starting to soar again

28 Mar 2023

The cosmic visions of Hilma af Klint

The Swedish artist is now fêted as a pioneer of abstract art, but her spiritual inclinations are what really resonate today

28 Mar 2023

The Tower of Babel now owes more to Bruegel than the Bible

When we think of the biblical folly, it’s Pieter Breugel the Elder’s painting that first comes to mind – but artists and writers are still reimagining it today

28 Mar 2023

The restless side of Felix Vallotton’s sleeping woman

At the MAH in Geneva, the artist Ugo Rondinone has rehung Le Sommeil to bring its livelier side to the fore, explains curator Samuel Gross

28 Mar 2023

Smooth operator – the seductive sculptures of Antonio Canova

The sculptor was regarded as too sensual by classicists and too cold by Romantics, but a more superficial look at his work suggests what he was really up to

28 Mar 2023
Alfred Wallace Russel

Alfred Russel Wallace’s botanical sketches are a natural wonder

The naturalist sketched his discoveries with unmatched dedication, but was unlucky to lose so many of the original specimens at sea

27 Mar 2023

Acquisitions of the Month: February 2023

David Bowie’s archive and the first clutch of NFTs to be acquired by a French museum are among this month’s highlights

28 Feb 2023

What the art world gets wrong about craft

The growing tendency to fold 20th-century makers into the history of modern art often ignores what was truly innovative about their work

27 Feb 2023
self-portrait of a man against a turquoise background

How do you solve a problem like Picasso?

While the artist’s life can pose difficulties, the Musée Picasso in Paris is finding ways to open up his work for a new generation

27 Feb 2023

The sensational collections of the Sassoon family

Long after David Sassoon’s descendants had entered the highest echelons of English society, their collecting reflected the family’s ties to the Middle East, India and China

27 Feb 2023
Barbara Hepworth carving in her studio

How Barbara Hepworth got into a new groove

The Palais de Danse in St Ives allowed the sculptor’s work to grow in ambition

27 Feb 2023

On its 300th birthday, the Belvedere reflects on a remarkably complicated past

Built as a residence for Prince Eugene of Savoy, the Vienna museum with a tangled history is now a home for Old Masters and modern art

27 Feb 2023

A Netherlandish Saint Luke dressed up to the nines

Stephan Kemperdick of Berlin’s Gemäldegalerie talks Apollo through Hugo van der Goes’s stylish depiction of the saint

27 Feb 2023

The street dog that has found a home among some pedigree chums

A portrait of pooch at the Ashmolean can more than hold its own among more rarefied breeds

23 Feb 2023

The Dutch painters who kept their eyes peeled for citrus fruit

The Low Countries may not grow oranges and lemons, but the artists of the region certainly had a zest for them

22 Feb 2023
Manchester Museum

The Manchester Museum is put on community service

A £15 million renovation has provided a new gallery and additional exhibition space but the displays are less about the objects than the stories they tell

22 Feb 2023

Between the vines – contemporary art at Spier Wine Farm

One of South Africa’s oldest wine estates has developed strong ties with the country’s leading artists

22 Feb 2023

New wine in old bottles – contemporary art in historical settings

It has become increasingly common for museums to invite artists to respond to their collections, but what kind of connections are we being invited to make?

22 Feb 2023
Museum of Fine Arts Boston protests

Are artists who work at museums too easy to exploit as workers?

The desirability of getting a day job in a museum can make it easy for prestigious institutions to take advantage of the artists who work in them

13 Feb 2023

How did the great liberator of Venice end up in Ham House?

A portrait of the 17th-century polymath and intellectual superstar Paolo Sarpi hangs in a corner of a house that once belonged to a wealthy tyrant

10 Feb 2023

Acquisitions of the Month: January 2023

A first for the Frick and a Caillebotte at the Musée d’Orsay are among the most important works to enter museum collections this month

3 Feb 2023