Michael Prodger is Reviews Editor at the New Statesman. He is an art historian, Senior Research Fellow at the University of Buckingham, and a former literary editor.
The history of art is filled with family relationships: but perhaps the most distinguished is that between brothers-in-law Andrea Mantegna (c1430-1506) and Giovanni Bellini (c1435-1516).
When the war finally came to an end, artists on both sides had to face the problem of how to paint the peace.
Thomas Cole’s pictures revealed to his fellow citizens the majesty of their land while warning them of hubris.
His paintings are joyous and beautiful, great sheets of throbbing colour interspersed with squares, circles and ragged patches of different hues.
Jones’s burners are off, but his face shows no fear: here is a creature that would luxuriate in hellfire as if it were as pleasurable as a hot shower.
It was, for the artist, a year of intense and focused activity – even by his own standards.
A striking new exhibition at Tate Britain looks afresh at the “school of London” in a period seemingly dominated by American abstract expressionism and pop art.
Monarchical pomp, misadventure and backroom deals.
They are the latest to attempt to nail down the slippery nature of paint on canvas.
The Italian artist has come to personify la vie bohème. But it wasn’t always so.
