Opening and Closing in July

It takes a split second these days to create an image, and how many millions are recorded daily on mobile phones, possibly never to be looked at again? You can see it all happening in the palatial surroundings of the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna, definitely one of those tick-off destinations on many travellers' bucket lists, where those in search of instant pictorial satisfaction throng the imposing statue-lined staircase for a selfie or pout for a photo in the café under the spectacular cupola. But we're not in Vienna for a quick fix, we're at the KHM to admire something more enduring in the shape of art produced almost 500 years ago by Rembrandt and his pupil Samuel van Hoogstraten that was intended to mislead your eyes into seeing the real in the unreal. Artistic deception is the story at the centre of Rembrandt--Hoogstraten: Colour and Illusion , one of the most engrossing and best-staged exhibitions we've seen this year. And, somewhat surprisingly, a show wi...

Opening and Closing in July

The Ashmolean Museum in Oxford is reviving Pre-Raphaelites: Drawings & Watercolours, a show that closed after just five weeks last year due to the Covid pandemic. On from July 15 to November 27, this exhibition features more than 100 works from the museum's own outstanding Pre-Raphaelite collection; Rossetti, Burne-Jones, Holman Hunt and Millais are the big names.

There are two new exhibitions coming to the Lightbox in Woking, a venue we always enjoy visiting. Starting on July 9, Eric Ravilious and Edward Bawden are the stars of a collaboration with the Fry Art Gallery in Saffron Walden that looks at the story of the artists' colony at Great Bardfield in Essex; more than 30 paintings and drawings will be on display. The Ingram Collection & the Fry Art Gallery: 'Bawden, Ravilious and the Art of Great Bardfield' runs until October 9. The second show, beginning on July 16, sets 20 paintings, prints and drawings of Venice and England by Canaletto alongside work from Melissa McGill's multidisciplinary public art project Red Regatta, which was presented in Venice in 2019. Canaletto and Melissa McGill: Performance and Panorama is on until November 13.

Woking's got much to recommend it, but be honest: Wouldn't you really rather be in the south of France? There's an enticing-looking exhibition at the Musée Bonnard in Le Cannet, close to Cannes, starting on July 2 that looks at how Pierre Bonnard and other artists of his generation, including Maurice Denis, Félix Vallotton and Edouard Vuillard, created captivating images of childhood. Enfances rêvées: Bonnard, les Nabis et l'enfance runs until November 6 and will feature more than 80 works.

Or what about Baden-Baden this summer? The Painters of the Sacred Heart at the Frieder Burda Museum focuses on five French exponents of naïve art, most prominently Henri Rousseau and Séraphine Louis. Predominantly made up of works from a collection assembled over six decades by the late German gallery-owner Charlotte Zander, it's on from July 16 to November 20.

At the Städel Museum in Frankfurt, the spotlight is on a largely forgotten German-Swiss woman artist. Self Determined: The Painter Ottilie W. Roederstein, starting on July 20, features 75 paintings and drawings by a woman who was once renowned across Europe and America; in 1902, she was the first contemporary female artist to be represented in the Städel's collection. This show runs to October 16.

We really loved Whistler's Woman in White: Joanna Hiffernan at the Royal Academy in London earlier this year, exploring the brilliant white art that resulted from the relationship between the painter James McNeill Whistler and his model Hiffernan. If you're on the other side of the Atlantic, the good news is that you now have a chance to catch this beautiful show at the National Gallery of Art in Washington from July 3. It's on until October 10.

Last chance to see....

You have a matter of days, until July 3 in fact, to catch the excellent free show entitled Eileen Mayo: A Natural History at Towner Eastbourne revealing the wide range of art created by Mayo, better known as a model for the likes of Laura Knight and Dod Procter. The Towner also has two new exhibitions on: A Life in Art: Lucy Wertheim, Patron, Collector, Gallerist and Reuniting the Twenties Group: From Barbara Hepworth to Victor Pasmore.

The hugely atmospheric exploration of The World of Stonehenge at the British Museum in London runs until July 17, with some breathtaking objects from across the millennia in gold, bone, stone and even wood.

Book now to avoid disappointment for Raphael at London's National Gallery, which ends on July 31; the final weekend is already sold out. Lots of stunning loans from Italian museums in particular are among the highlights of this exhibition which provides a full overview of Raphael's achievements in a brief but brilliant career.

Images

Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Reverie, 1868, Ashmolean Museum, University of Oxford
Henri Rousseau, Le Lion, ayant faim, se jette sur l'antilope, 1898/1905, Fondation Beyeler, Riehen/Basel. Photo: bpk/Roman März

James Abbott McNeill Whistler, Symphony in White, No 2: The Little White Girl, 1864, Tate Britain

Raphael, Bindo Altoviti, about 1516-18, National Gallery of Art, Washington

Opening and Closing in October

There's been a spate of exhibitions over the past few years aimed at redressing centuries of neglect of the work of women artists, and the Italian Baroque painter Artemisia Gentileschi is the latest to come into focus, at the National Gallery in London, starting on October 3. Most of the works have never been seen in Britain before, and they cover a lengthy career that features strong female figures in Biblical and classical scenes, as well as self-portraits. Until January 24. Also starting at the National on October 7 is a free exhibition that looks at Sin , as depicted by artists from Diego Velázquez and William Hogarth through to Tracey Emin, blurring the boundaries between the religious and the secular. This one runs until January 3. Tate Britain shows this winter how JMW Turner embraced the rapid industrial and technological advances at the start of the 19th century and recorded them in his work. Turner's Modern World , starting on October 28, will inclu...

The Thrill of Pleasure: Bridget Riley

Prepare yourself for some sensory overload. Curves, stripes, zig-zags, wavy lines, dots, in black and white or colour. Look at many of the paintings of Bridget Riley and you're unable to escape the eerie sensation that the picture in front of you is in motion, has its own inner three-dimensional life, is not just inert paint on flat canvas, panel or plaster. It's by no means unusual to see selections of Riley's paintings on display, but a blockbuster exhibition at the Scottish National Gallery in Edinburgh brings together 70 years of her pictures in a dazzling extravaganza of abstraction, including a recreation of her only actual 3D work, which you walk into for a perspectival sensurround experience. It's "that thrill of pleasure which sight itself reveals," as Riley once said. It's a really terrific show, and the thrill of pleasure in the Scottish capital was enhanced by the unexpected lack of visitors on the day we went to see it, with huge empty sp...

Angelica Kauffman: Breaking Through the 18th-Century Glass Ceiling

In the late 18th century, Angelica Kauffman was famous throughout Europe, one of the leading international painters of the day. A success in London, Venice and Rome, she attracted commissions from Catherine the Great, the Emperor of Austria and the Pope. She was a close friend of Goethe, a founding member of Britain's Royal Academy. When she died in 1807, her lavish funeral in Rome drew enormous crowds. A far from ordinary life, then. And for an 18th-century woman in the male-dominated world of art, an utterly extraordinary one. She achieved equal pay, got women wearing trousers, drew male nudes and even had a pre-nup. It's a story that's arrestingly told in Angelica Kauffman: Artist, Superwoman, Influencer , a fine exhibition now on at the Kunstpalast in Dusseldorf that will be heading to London, and naturally the Royal Academy , this summer. Kauffman was born in Chur in eastern Switzerland in 1741 and was a child prodigy, not just as a painter but also as a singer...

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Rembrandt & van Hoogstraten: The Art of Illusion

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