Opening and Closing in March

Pan-European art superstar Angelica Kauffman comes to the Royal Academy in London on March 1. Feted in London, Venice and Rome in the late 18th century, and indeed a founding member of the RA, she was one of the few women to smash through the glass ceiling of the male-dominated art world. Known above all for her celebrity portraits, she also created history paintings with a female slant. Kauffman was originally due a retrospective at the RA in 2020 before Covid struck, and we saw that show at the Kunstpalast in Dusseldorf. Her story is a fascinating one though, to be frank, we found the history more intriguing than some of her art. You can see Kauffman at the RA until June 30.  

Two more women at Charleston in Lewes, but a very different tale. Dorothy Hepworth and Patricia Preece: An Untold Story from March 27 to September 8 relates how, over decades, the couple fooled the art world: The shy Hepworth created widely praised paintings that she signed not in her own name but that of her charismatic partner, Preece. Augustus John called Preece one of England's greatest women artists. It wasn't till Preece died in 1966 that the secret was revealed. Hepworth and Preece, who was the second wife of Stanley Spencer in an ill-fated marriage, are buried together in Cookham churchyard. 

The Queen's Gallery in Edinburgh is reopening after an 18-month closure for maintenance work, and it'll now be known as the King's Gallery. The first show is Style & Society: Dressing the Georgians, a thoroughly fascinating display of paintings, prints and costume from the Royal Collection examining the changing way people clothed themselves and lived more generally throughout the 18th century. It's on from March 22 to September 22, and we can absolutely recommend it, because we had hours of pleasure when we saw it last year at the Queen's Gallery in London, soon also to be rebranded the King's Gallery.  

Staying in Scotland, do you know what the country's national animal is? No, not the Monarch of the Glen, but the unicorn. The significance of this mythical creature down the ages is the theme of the inaugural exhibition at the revamped Perth Museum when it opens on March 30. Art treasures and historic objects from around the UK and beyond will be among the exhibits. Unicorn will be on until September 22. 

One of 2024's most notable art anniversaries marks 150 years since the first Impressionist exhibition in Paris. The biggest show in town this year is Paris 1874: Inventing Impressionism at the Musée d'Orsay, starting on March 26. The museum will be presenting a selection of works from the radical Impressionist exhibition -- Cezanne, Degas, Monet, Morisot, Renoir and more -- and contrasting them with exhibits from the official Salon of 1874, the approved art of the day. This show is on until July 14, and then moves to the National Gallery of Art in Washington from September to January. But wait, there's more at the Musée d'Orsay, which from March 26 to August 11 is offering Tonight with the Impressionists, a one-hour immersive virtual-reality experience taking you back to the first night of the 1874 exhibition....

Think of some typical Impressionist motifs, and a view of the Normandy coast will surely be near the top of the list. But Impressionism and the Sea at the Musée des impressionnismes in Giverny aims to go beyond that cliché, looking deeper into the fascination the subject held for a broad group of artists including Gauguin, Courbet and Boudin. The show is part of this year's Normandie Impressionniste festival, and it runs from March 29 to June 30. 

Meanwhile, in Cologne, the Wallraf-Richartz-Museum is looking back to the decade before the first Impressionist exhibition and exploring how and why it came about. There are some big names and there look to be some fine paintings, with major loans from across the Atlantic and around Europe. 1863 Paris 1874: Revolution in Art -- From the Salon to Impressionism is on from March 15 to July 28. 

Another anniversary, slightly delayed: One of Pop Art's stars was born in 1923, so that's the reason for Roy Lichtenstein: A Centennial Exhibition at the Albertina Museum in Vienna from March 8 to July 14. Famous works on show include Drowning Girl from MoMA in New York and Woman in Bath from the Thyssen in Madrid, and there'll be more than 90 paintings, sculptures and prints in what's intended to be a comprehensive retrospective. 

Across the city, the Belvedere has an exhibition devoted to an artist we've only become aware of recently: Broncia Koller-Pinell (1863-1934). Her painting The Artist's Mother was part of the After Impressionism show last year at London's National Gallery. The Belvedere exhibition will display her major works and explore her links with her contemporaries in central Europe including Egon Schiele. Broncia Koller-Pinell: An Artist and her Network is on from March 15 to September 8. 

In the 1860s, a new art movement was being created in the Netherlands: the Hague School of painters who took to the open air to depict nature as realistically as possible, concentrating on light and atmosphere. The Kunstmuseum in, naturally enough, The Hague is showing The Hague School in a Different Light from March 16 to September 1; Take a short trip down the road to Scheveningen beach and you'll be able to see that light for yourself.

Last chance to see....

The show at the Musée Marmottan Monet in Paris about the leading woman Impressionist Berthe Morisot and her love of 18th-century art ends on March 3. We really enjoyed the London version of this exhibition at the Dulwich Picture Gallery last year. 

Images 

Angelica Kauffman (1741-1807), Portrait of Emma, Lady Hamilton, as Muse of Comedy, 1791, Private collection

Luca Longhi (1507-1580), The Lady and the Unicorn, 1535-40. © Castel Sant'Angelo, Rome 
Pere Borrell del Caso (1835-1910), Escaping Criticism, 1874, Banco de España Collection, Madrid. © Photo: Banco de España, Madrid
Jan Hendrik Weissenbruch (1824-1903), Beach Scene, 1887, Kunstmuseum Den Haag