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...
At a time when the world has been shaken by a series of catastrophic election results, France is growing increasingly nervous about the approaching presidential contest in April. Running counter to these trends is the Tefaf antiques fair in Maastricht, taking place...
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...
New York is the international epicentre of the art market. And it’s here, from 2 until 5 March, that The Armory Show, a fair that is emblematic of the city, takes place, assembling 210 contemporary and modern art galleries along the banks of the Hudson. It is also the...
This exhibition is the first of its kind. It doesn't just tell the history of an art dealer but also the history of art, the history of a family and plain History with a capital H, filled with the blood and tears of the Second World War. ‘21 rue La Boétie’ is the...
Diego Giacometti (1902-1985), the brother and close collaborator of the illustrious sculptor Alberto Giacometti, has a seat in the pantheon of 20th century decorative arts. Hubert de Givenchy (born 1926), whose creations were made famous by the actor Audrey Hepburn...
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...
Edgar Degas (1834-1917), a major artist from the dawn of modernism, both as a painter and a sculptor, died exactly 100 years ago this year. A hundred years is how long it took for a forgotten box containing 55 unseen drawings by this exceptional artist to appear on...
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...