Art
Lucian Freud’s Shadow Self
As a displaced refugee, Freud knew he would always be something of a stranger to himself, but how much would he ever wish to know of himself?
Michael Glover
Art
Paintings by the Famous, the Forgotten, and the Emerging
Two exhibitions explore the work of three painters in a chain of influence: Alan Davie, David Hockney, and Christina Quarles.
Books
A Peek Into Some of the Best Art Books of 2019
Paula Rego, John Ruskin, Donald Judd, Lucian Freud, Hokusai, and, yes, Leonardo da Vinci.
Art
When the West Dreamt of Odalisques
Inspired by the East: How the Islamic World Influenced Western Art is a giant teaching aid of a fairly solid and dependable kind, but one that does not quite push far enough.
Art
When Leonardo da Vinci Just Isn’t Enough
Leonardo’s “Virgin” meets virtual reality — simpleminded in the extreme.
Art
Caravaggio and Bernini, Together at Last
We could call this exhibition a battle of the swaggerers.
Art
Leonardo da Vinci, Lost at the Louvre
What exactly is the matter with this exhibition? We had expected to be excited from the start, but we are not.
Art
Gauguin’s Predatory Colonial Gaze
Is it fair to use contemporary standards to judge a man who died 116 years ago?
Art
A Painter Embraces Inauthenticity
Albert Oehlen has been a wild spirit from first to last.
Art
Damien Hirst, Turning In Circles
Hirst has been an erratic artist from the beginning, just as likely to fail as to succeed.
Art
Kara Walker’s Monument to Monstrousness
Can the enduring presence of such monuments among us still have the power to reinforce deep-rooted prejudices, by the very fact that they have simply not gone away?
Art
The Hollow Heart of Antony Gormley’s Spectacle
Is there something self-aggrandizing about Gormley’s career-long obsession with making casts of his own body?