In Paris, a stone’s throw from the Boulevard Saint Germain, an exceptional new show has just opened that looks into the creative process behind Dutch masterpieces of 17th century. It involved a police-like investigation of history to locate the drawings that helped to...
In this age of political upheavals, with possible economic reverberations, the major art market trend is identifying any artists from our recent past that have been unfairly skipped over. It’s a sensible decision. Their careers are already established and their artist...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1tpuBstGmFs In art, even contemporary art, chronology matters. In other words, who did what before whom. To give you an example, in 1915 the entire world from Russia to Germany, passing through Montevideo, was doing...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n0NLVDadpcQ The most powerful pieces of art are the ones that offer the potential for multiple readings. In the work of the French artist Annette Messager (born 1943) ambiguity itself becomes an art form. The winner of the Golden...
The lady in question is one of the most influential ever bestowed to us by the history of art. Nobody has painted anything more touching or arguably more beautiful since. As of 1659, this woman from a humble background, in a dress cut from a coarse cloth which can be...
On 16 April of last year I posted an article about a fabulous exhibition by the Greek artist Jannis Kounellis at La Monnaie in Paris. He has just died at the age of 80. Here is a homage to an artist who created harmonious works from the most thankless raw materials....
True connoisseurs of Picasso will already know it well. In the village of Gisors, an hour outside Paris, the Boisgeloup studio is whispered about in hushed tones and is central to the work of the Spanish artist. It’s where he created a collection of exceptional...
The press conference for the Venice Biennale, arguably the world’s most important contemporary art event, takes place three months earlier and is usually quite a  confusing affair. Not this time.  Here's a foretaste of what the 57th Venice Biennale, curated...
Switzerland is a unique blend of alpine culture, cows, rustic tradition, cheese, and world-class expertise in such diverse domains as watchmaking, banking and contemporary art. Every two years, in Gstaad, a show called Elevation 1049 perfectly incarnates these two...
The greatest artists present us with endless opportunities to discover new sides to their work. A perfect example is at the Beyeler Foundation in Basel, Switzerland, where 62 paintings by Claude Monet are currently on display. The thematic hanging and the choice of...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u-53EMSOgRQ Anyone who has visited Naoshima and Teshima, the art islands in the Seto Inland Sea in Japan which have been transformed by the visionary businessman Soichiro Fukutake into spaces that marry beauty and nature,...
It is not unheard of for museums, through their programming schedules, to inadvertently reprise entire chapters of art history. As I write, on one side of the Channel, in Paris, at Pompidou Center, is the fabulous Cy Twombly retrospective, showing until 24 April. (...