Light from the Middle East offers a true reflection of a complex region
14 November 2012 • Mark Westall
A new exhibition at London’s V&A offers insights from within cultures that are more often photographed and reported from the outside
Tag: Blogposts
A Monet for £27m? The real price of the art boom is its sleaziness
8 November 2012 • Mark Westall
As a Christie’s sale is criticised for not offering enough ‘trophy property’, it’s clear to see what the art world has become
Photography exhibitions guide – the three to see this week
27 October 2012 • Mark Westall
The Observer’s deputy picture editor, Jim Powell, rounds up reviews of three exhibitions this week: William Eggleston, Bruce Davidson and Graciela Iturbide at the Barbican, August Sander at New Walk Gallery, Leicester, and Ewen Spencer at the White Cloth Gallery, Leeds
Art: the blood sport for the ultra-wealthy?
20 October 2012 • Mark Westall
The value of this week’s seven stolen masterpieces pales into insignificance against the prices charged, legally, for art today
Dutch art theft: a pick’n’mix of paintings reduced to criminal collateral
16 October 2012 • Mark Westall
A beguiling Freud, a dazzling Matisse, a modest De Haan: will these stolen paintings see the light again?
Tate Modern’s rehang cannot diminish the majesty of Mark Rothko
23 August 2012 • Mark Westall
The space reserved for the painter’s mural-sized masterpieces might be modest, but his dark vision still blazes bright
Kiss and tell: street artists imitate Gustav Klimt’s erotic art
22 August 2012 • Mark Westall
A crew of nine leading lights from the street art scene are making new works inspired by the great, sensual Austrian – and Mode 2’s response is characteristically provocative
Crazy golftime for Hitler: should we salute the Chapman brothers’ statue?
15 August 2012 • Mark Westall
A model of Hitler on a crazy golf course at Grundy Art Gallery has been called ‘tasteless’ by a Jewish organisation. But shouldn’t artists have the right to offend?
Robert Hughes: the greatest art critic of our time
8 August 2012 • Mark Westall
Rude, hilarious, eloquent, but never petty … the Australian writer, who has died aged 74, made criticism look like literature
Will you ring Creed’s bell to mark the start of the Olympics?
26 July 2012 • Mark Westall
Artist Martin Creed has asked us all to ring a bell on the first day of the Olympics. Creed believes in public art of the collective, but what does it really mean if we all ring a bell at once?
Let’s hear it for Bruce Nauman, sculptor of sound
30 June 2012 • Mark Westall
In his new sound art installation, Days, at the ICA, Nauman sculpts the space with voices, giving sound a physicality that will open your ears to a whole new world of noise
New photography from the Middle East comes to London
30 June 2012 • Mark Westall
An exhibition at the V&A in London this November offers a long-overdue opportunity to admire the sophistication of contemporary Middle Eastern photographic artists
Picasso: the brains behind the brawn
29 May 2012 • Mark Westall
We think of Picasso as a man’s man, a sensualist; but his work is fiercely intellectual. And the British Museum’s exhibition of his Vollard Suite prints proves that he is all about brain work
Richard Hamilton: the Duchamp-ion of intellectual art
15 May 2012 • Mark Westall
The father of pop art – who is to be the subject of a posthumous exhibition at the National Gallery – also rediscovered and popularised the once-neglected work of Marcel Duchamp
The British Museum’s Hajj takes us on a pilgrimage, not a propaganda journey
20 March 2012 • Mark Westall
The Observer’s Nick Cohen has laid into the British Museum for allowing Saudi Arabia to sponsor its Hajj exhibition. But Hajj has no political agenda; it simply captures the beauty of Islam
Thin line between art and hate: is this the most repellent work of modern art?
13 January 2012 • Mark Westall
The Chapman brothers’ sneering sculpture of Stephen Hawking sickened me in 1995, and still does now. What do you think is the most hateful work of modern art?
Martin Scorsese and Tacita Dean go back to the future of film
6 January 2012 • Mark Westall
Scorsese’s Hugo, shot in 3D, is an excited paean to film history using modern techniques. But Dean’s much darker Film, at Tate Modern, mourns the passing of celluloid
Carsten Höller in New York: all the fun of the fair
26 October 2011 • Mark Westall
Carsten Höller has brought his trademark helterskelters, fairground carousels, and aquaria to New York City
What colour should gallery walls be?
21 October 2011 • Mark Westall
The Musée d’Orsay in Paris has joined the Wallace Collection in trying out different background shades. But is anything beyond white just a distraction?
The dark arts of Los Angeles
15 September 2011 • Mark Westall
This autumn, galleries and museums across the Californian city will celebrate its historic art scene. Just don’t expect rainbows
Was postmodernism born with Close Encounters of the Third Kind?
5 September 2011 • Mark Westall
The V&A is preparing to celebrate a cultural movement that has baffled some and invigorated others. But did it all begin with Steven Spielberg’s 1977 SF film?
The Artist Rooms collection is transforming our visual culture
1 September 2011 • Mark Westall
From Kiefer in Llandudno to Warhol in Hull, Anthony d’Offay’s roadshow is bringing great modern art to a wider audience
David Hockney: the outsider who sees, and paints, the bigger picture
26 August 2011 • Mark Westall
Pop art’s enfant terrible continues to influence modern culture and create memorable images – but from the outside, ignoring London fashions
Street art is dying – and it’s our fault
25 August 2011 • Mark Westall
David Cameron poses in front of it, old folks own books about it … has graffiti’s entry into polite society come at too high a price?