The White Cliffs of Dover, Beachy Head and the Seven Sisters, the Needles and Durdle Door -- the southern English coastline has plenty of spectacular chalk and limestone features, but just across the Channel the French have got something equally if not more stunning: the chalk cliffs at Etretat. Surrounding the bay of what was once a small fishing village, three natural arches and a 70-metre freestanding needle of chalk are a breathtaking sight (we were there a couple of years ago), and they're now a huge tourist attraction. But even before the tourists got there, some of the most famous names in French art had discovered a motif of which they rarely tired; as Normandy Tourism puts it: "Nature has carved unusual shapes out of the white cliffs in Etretat, and as a result, this picturesque spot attracted many Impressionist painters, who sought to capture the cliffs on canvas." Etretat, Beyond the Cliffs: Courbet, Monet, Matisse is devoted to those depictions of the white...
The highest-profile opening in London this January? It might well be Francis Bacon: Man and Beast at the Royal Academy. Starting on January 29, this exhibition will focus on Bacon's fascination with animals, featuring pictures in which the boundaries between humans and animals are constantly blurred. Spanning his entire career, the show will include a trio of bullfight paintings never before exhibited together. If your New Year's resolution is to go vegetarian, this one may be a bit on the fleshy side. Until April 17. For something perhaps a bit less unsettling, head to Room 1 at the National Gallery to see Gainsborough's Blue Boy . Thomas Gainsborough's full-length canvas of a child was exhibited at the National for three weeks in 1922 before sailing across the Atlantic to the Huntington Library in California. It's a painting that's long had a hold on the imagination; it's been frequently referenced in Hollywood movies, and now it's being loaned out b...