Opening and Reopening in August

When we visit the Netherlands or come across the Dutch abroad, we always feel they know how to relax and enjoy life. Visit Museum De Lakenhal in Leiden and you'll see in their latest exhibition that this joie de vivre has a long tradition. The gallery is looking back 400 years to the birth in the city of Jan Steen, who frequently painted his countrymen having a good time. And yes, on occasion, perhaps just a little bit too much of a good time. In this show, At Home with Jan Steen -- 400 Years of Merrymaking , you will discover why the Dutch use the expression "a Jan Steen household" for a home where, well, things are maybe just a bit too free and easy. This is the painting that sums it up: What a jolly time everyone is having in The Merry Family . To the accompaniment of music, they are indeed making merry: singing, drinking and smoking. All are taking part; the old, the young, and even a baby wielding a spoon. The baby's not partaking of the alcohol or tobacco, adm...

Opening and Reopening in August

August is normally a thin month for new exhibitions, but as more and more museums and galleries open up again to the public, August 2020 will be rather busier than normal.

In London, the Royal Academy gives a new lease of life to one show that was interrupted by the coronavirus lockdown and celebrates the delayed start of another.

The interrupted show looks at Léon Spilliaert, an artist whose finest work stems from his years at home in Ostend at the start of the 20th century, wandering the Belgian port city at night, haunted by insomnia and stomach troubles. It was the last exhibition we reviewed before lockdown, and Spilliaert really couldn't be a better symbol for social distancing, pictured alone in his studio or capturing the eeriness of deserted streets or beaches. August 5 to September 20.

Two days after the Spilliaert show restarts, the RA welcomes Gauguin and the Impressionists: Masterpieces from the Ordrupgaard Collection in Denmark, which is currently undergoing renovation. There are 60 works on show, with Monet, Manet, Degas, Renoir, Pissarro and Morisot among the other artists represented. This exhibition runs until October 18. Royal Academy opening hours are currently severely restricted, and with the number of visitors allowed in per hour limited, tickets for both these shows will be scarce.

On August 10, the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford will be reopening, with limited tickets available for Young Rembrandt, the story of how an initially not particularly brilliant young artist from Leiden worked his way to the very top. Seeing Rembrandt blossom into one of the greatest painters of all time makes for an absolutely absorbing exhibition; we thought it was the best thing we saw in all of 2019 when we caught it in Leiden in the autumn. The run in Oxford will continue until November 1.

At the Pallant House Gallery in Chichester, the doors open to the public again on August 5, allowing for the resumption of Barnett Freedman: Designs for Modern Britain, a look at one of the most prominent commercial designers of the middle of the 20th century. Freedman worked on posters, stamps and book covers, and this is the first major retrospective for more than 60 years, running till November 1.

One of the most striking works of art produced in 1920s Germany is Ernst Barlach's Floating Angel, a mesmerising bronze sculpture that we were lucky enough to see in the Tate's show on the Aftermath of World War I a couple of years ago. Now the Albertinum in Dresden is staging the first ever comprehensive overview of Ernst Barlach on the 150th Anniversary of his Birth, with a focus on his wood carving. It's on from August 8 to January 10.

From the Albertinum in Dresden to the Albertina in Vienna, where the curtain goes up on August 27 on Van Gogh, Cézanne, Matisse: The Hahnloser Collection, featuring about 120 works from one of the most important private assemblies of late 19th- and early 20th-century French art. The renovation of the collection's normal home in Winterthur in Switzerland offers the Austrian capital a chance to admire paintings by the likes of Vuillard and Bonnard as well as outstanding Swiss painters such as Ferdinand Hodler and Félix Vallotton. The Vienna show runs until November 15.

Of course, you may be asking yourself, is it safe to actually go and see an exhibition? Maybe you're better off just going for a drive. The Dutch have the answer: a pop-up show in Rotterdam, the Boijmans Ahoy Drive-Thru Museum. The venue is the Ahoy conference and event centre (site of this year's cancelled Eurovision Song Contest), the art is from the Boijmans van Beuningen museum, currently undergoing a makeover. You book a timeslot in an electric car and drive at minimal speed round a vast exhibition hall to see around 50 artworks, with Oskar Kokoschka and Anselm Kiefer among those featuring. August 1-23.

Last chance to see....

Still on at the Mauritshuis in The Hague until August 30: George Stubbs -- The Man, the Horse, the Obsession, showing how Stubbs became the most celebrated painter of horseflesh in England and featuring the first ever appearance of his masterpiece, Whistlejacket, in mainland Europe. This is a smaller version of the hugely impressive show we saw in Milton Keynes last year.

Do check museum websites for booking details, opening times and conditions of entry, as these vary greatly.

Images

Rembrandt van Rijn, Self-Portrait in a Cap, Open-Mouthed, 1630, Ashmolean Museum, University of Oxford

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