The Top 7 Art Exhibitions to see in London this week
25 November 2018 • Tabish Khan
This week’s Top 7 Art Exhibitions to see in London include Science fiction, Pikachu, skinning buildings, a hairy mannequin, tribal statues, Trump and Chernobyl.
Tag: Reviews
REVIEW: Joseph Beuys: Utopia at the Stag Monuments
24 April 2018 • Staff
On the eastern front in 1944, rear gunner Joseph Beuys (b1921-d1986) was—according to his own personal mythology— rescued from a burning Stuka by Tatar nomads and wrapped in fat and felt. These totemic materials predominate throughout the German artist’s work, with the myth as a resonating centre of meaning, both personal and historical, even if the story itself isn’t really true.
Review: Folkestone triennial – beached bungalows and giant jelly mould pavilions
3 September 2017 • Syndicate
Antony Gormley sculptures lurk under the promenade, Richard Woods invades town with huts for second-homers, while Bob and Roberta Smith treats local kids to art lessons. An eye-catching battle is raging at the Kent seaside between rich and poor, social decay and civic pride
REVIEW: Soul of a Nation – the extraordinary art of the black power era
16 July 2017 • Syndicate
Tate Modern, London
Civil rights meet aesthetics in this riveting survey of 20 crucial years of black American art and struggle
Review: Soul of a Nation – the sorrowful, shattering art of black power
13 July 2017 • Mark Westall
Tate Modern, London
Searing artistic responses to the agony of America’s racial struggle sit alongside powerful abstracts by forgotten artists. This compelling show puts the battle for civil rights in a brutal, brilliant new light
What’s Wrong With Art? Everyone’s a Critic
16 June 2017 • Tabish Khan
Some critics lack the bravery to give negative reviews
Well now there’s a new type of critic on the horizon, the average person.
Giacometti review – master of all things thin
22 May 2017 • Mark Westall
Tate Modern, London
Fight your way through the spindly hordes at this huge, overcrowded Giacometti show and you’ll find a tender, protean artist who is still uniquely strange
REVIEW: Phyllida Barlow – Venice invaded by loo rolls and brilliant buffoonery
9 May 2017 • Syndicate
British Pavilion, Venice Biennale
The 73-year-old sculptor’s most significant show yet is a crowded game of associations, where skeletal megaphones spar with concrete clods. But is there space for us to play too?
REVIEW: Picasso: Minotaurs and Matadors – sex and death in the bullring
29 April 2017 • Syndicate
Gagosian, London
The macho man of Spanish painting was obsessed with bulls. For him they were symbols of mythic power, but also impotence and mortality
REVIEW: Damien Hirst: Treasures from the Wreck of the Unbelievable – beautiful and monstrous
17 April 2017 • Syndicate
Punta della Dogana and Palazzo Grassi, Venice
Filling two museums with ancient ‘treasure’, Hirst’s spectacular mix of storytelling, invention and humour is art for a post-truth world
REVIEW: Damien Hirst: Treasures from the Wreck of the Unbelievable
8 April 2017 • Syndicate
Palazzo Grassi and Punta della Dogana, Venice
Artist has once again found the underwater grotto in his mind where monsters live, making a fool out of all of us who lost faith
REVIEW: Marc Quinn: Drawn from Life; Cerith Wyn Evans
5 April 2017 • Syndicate
Sir John Soane’s Museum; Tate Britain, London
Marc Quinn’s sculptures reduce classicism to blunt desire, while Cerith Wyn Evans’s Tate commission is an illuminated blank
Queer British Art 1861-1967 review – strange, sexy, heartwrenching
4 April 2017 • Syndicate
From Man Ray’s portrait of Virginia Woolf to Orton’s library book collages and Noël Coward’s dressing gown, this vital survey is bursting with fascinating stories
A World View: John Latham; Speak review – a time-bending experience
6 March 2017 • Mark Westall
Serpentine Gallery; Serpentine Sackler Gallery, London
From proto-psychedelic film to book chewing, the hardcore conceptual art of John Latham continues to inspire
‘The cat in the coffin almost steals the show’ … the Deutsche Börse photography prize
3 March 2017 • Syndicate
Landscapes at night, a hallucinatory road trip, ghetto life after the LA riots and a dead pet … our critic weighs the contenders
Wolfgang Tillmans review – a rollercoaster ride around the world
15 February 2017 • Syndicate
Tate Modern, London
Cities from the sky, cigarette still lifes and sunset drives … the German’s swirling show has got the lot – even a room to dance in
Revolution: Russian Art 1917-1932 review – when anything was possible
14 February 2017 • Syndicate
Royal Academy, London
From singing peasants to Soviet mugshots, history shapes everything in this momentous show
REVIEW: David Hockney – sunshine superman
12 February 2017 • Syndicate
Tate Britain, London
From sunny California to the landscapes of his native Yorkshire, Hockney’s humanity and optimism are never far away, as this sprawling retrospective shows
Everything you need for a techno-utopian retirement
15 January 2017 • Mark Westall
Design Museum, London
From next-gen mobility scooters to bloodstream nanobots, this pop-up exhibition explores how technology can better help an ageing population
Yves Klein review – a superheated plunge into the wild blue yonders
21 October 2016 • Mark Westall
Tate Liverpool
From the Fire Paintings to the works made with women’s bodies, this is a sublime homage to the visionary artist
Amalia Ulman Dances on top of Privilege for her London Solo Show at Arcadia Missa
8 October 2016 • Staff
Crimson balloons festooning the ceiling, a black and white checkerboard dance floor under foot, shimmery white curtains partially covering views of the Manhattan skyline…
Frieze art fair 2016 review: Everyone’s a performer in the boozy, fruity house of fun
7 October 2016 • Syndicate
From the crocheted loo seats to the pram-cum-barbecue and roving wet bar, there are stunts and stage-props galore. Then you turn a corner and find an artwork that sticks in your head and stays there
Ragnar Kjartansson review – a brilliant fusion of humour and sorrow
19 July 2016 • Syndicate
Barbican, London
Prepare to be enchanted by the playful, melancholy, sociable art of Iceland’s Ragnar Kjartansson
Georgia O’Keeffe at Tate Modern review – one long, strange trip
7 July 2016 • Syndicate
Tate Modern, London
This blockbuster retrospective seeks to show there is more to Georgia O’Keeffe than anodyne prints, signature aprons and sexual stereotypes – but her own gorgeous, awkward art compounds the cliches
