Self-portraits; now, we've seen quite a lot of exhibitions of those over the years. You know how Rembrandt or Vincent van Gogh saw themselves. But how do artists depict other artists? What happens when Peter Blake meets David Hockney, when Eric Ravilious takes on Edward Bawden? Answers can be found at the Pallant House Gallery in Chichester in a very interesting and illuminating exhibition entitled Seeing Each Other: Portraits of Artists . And sometimes the artist you see is a different artist from the one you might be expecting. When Mary McCartney photographed Tracey Emin in 2000, what came out was Frida Kahlo. McCartney felt a close affinity with the Mexican artist, and so did Emin, whose controversial My Bed had just been shortlisted for the Turner Prize. McCartney said she'd had a daydream of Emin as Kahlo, who spent a lot of time in bed herself as a result of her disabling injuries. Emin was made up and dressed for the shoot, and then, according to McCartney , "...
Which Japanese artist had the greatest influence on the West at the end of the 19th century? Perhaps not so much Katsushika Hokusai, despite The Great Wave; maybe more Utagawa Hiroshige, four decades younger and the last great exponent of the ukiyo-e tradition, with his stunningly framed landscapes. From May 1, you have the chance at the British Museum in London to experience Horoshige's world, which ended just as Japan started to open up to the outside. Featuring a large body of work from a major US collection, Hiroshige: Artist of the Open Road is on until September 7.
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And also at the British Museum, a second new exhibition explores the origins of Hindu, Jain and Buddhist sacred art, going back at least 2,000 years. More than 180 objects from the museum's collection as well as items on loan will be on display. Ancient India: Living Traditions runs from May 22 to October 19.
If you enjoyed the colour and swagger of the John Singer Sargent show at Tate Britain a year ago, you'll be tempted by Heiress: Sargent's American Portraits at Kenwood House in Hampstead. Running from May 16 to October 5, this features 18 portraits of American women who crossed the Atlantic to marry into the British aristocracy, a group often dismissed as the "Dollar Princesses."
Of course, to fit the Americans in, the usual Kenwood residents have had to find board and lodging elsewhere: in Suffolk, at Thomas Gainsborough's House in Sudbury. And it's there from May 3 to October 19 that you can enjoy Masterpieces from Kenwood: The Splendour of British & French Painting, including François Boucher, Angelica Kauffman, Joshua Reynolds, and of course Gainsborough himself..jpg)
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The Watts Gallery in Compton, near Guildford, offers the chance to use your nose as well as your eyes to immerse yourself in the 19th century. Scented Visions: Smell in Art 1850-1915 comes to Surrey from the Barber Institute in Birmingham, aiming to provide "a bespoke olfactory experience inspired by key elements within selected Pre-Raphaelite works" by artists including John Frederick Lewis, John Everett Millais, Evelyn De Morgan and Dante Gabriel Rossetti. On from May 15 to November 9.
You'll rarely be disappointed by an exhibition at the Pallant House Gallery in Chichester. Their new show explores 125 years of artistic relationships in British painting, sculpture, photography and other genres, featuring more than 80 artists, including Lucian Freud, David Hockney, Lee Miller and Paula Rego. Seeing Each Other: Portraits of Artists runs from May 17 to November 2.
From one end of Sussex to the other for Sussex Modernism at Towner Eastbourne. This show aims to bring together painting, sculpture, film, literature, music and more from the late 19th century to the present to define a county that's "always, and ever, in flux". We're promised David Bowie, Edward Burra, Jacob Epstein, Gluck, Ivon Hitchens, Virginia Woolf and many more. May 23 to September 28.
And down in Plymouth, there's a chance to see Forbidden Territories: 100 Years of Surreal Landscapes, a show previously staged at the Hepworth in Wakefield. With work by artists including Salvador Dalí, Leonora Carrington, Ithell Colquhoun and Max Ernst, the exhibition at The Box runs from May 24 to September 7, and entry is free.
And down in Plymouth, there's a chance to see Forbidden Territories: 100 Years of Surreal Landscapes, a show previously staged at the Hepworth in Wakefield. With work by artists including Salvador Dalí, Leonora Carrington, Ithell Colquhoun and Max Ernst, the exhibition at The Box runs from May 24 to September 7, and entry is free.
The second of the shows in Switzerland marking the centenary of the death of Félix Vallotton gets under way on May 11. Félix Vallotton: A Monument to Beauty at Castello San Materno in Ascona, in the Italian-speaking southern canton of Ticino, concentrates on his landscapes, still lifes and nudes. It will feature several of Vallotton's series of graphic works and include loans from a major Swiss collection that haven't been seen in public for some time. On till September 7.
Like so many artists from the cold, dark North, Henri Matisse was constantly fascinated by the light and the colour of the Mediterranean, and he made repeated visits there. So this summer, at the Musée Matisse in Nice, they're looking at Matisse's work through the lens of the Med, and exploring his relationship with the region. Matisse Méditerranée(s) runs from May 7 to September 8.
Last chance to see....
May 4 is the final day at the Rembrandt House in Amsterdam to see The Illusionist, a show about the master of trompe l'oeil, Samuel van Hoogstraten. We caught him in a double bill with Rembrandt in Vienna late last year.
There may still be tickets available for the final days of the first run of the huge and hugely popular Flowers -- Flora in Contemporary Art & Culture show at the Saatchi Gallery in Chelsea, which closes on May 5. But if you can't make it, fear not: It'll be back on again at the same venue from May 30 to August 31.
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The big Surrealism centenary exhibition at the Mapfre Foundation in Madrid comes to an end on May 11. We saw the previous version at the Pompidou Centre in Paris last year. Next stop is the Kunsthalle in Hamburg, starting in mid-June.
In California, May 25 is the final day for the superb Gustave Caillebotte: Painting Men show at the Getty Center in Los Angeles. We were lucky enough to see this one in Paris too. Caillebotte will be rowing his boat on to the Art Institute of Chicago; the exhibition there starts at the end of June.
And finally, retrospectives of two very different women artists shut their doors on May 26. Dulwich Picture Gallery in south-east London says goodbye to the somewhat fantastical world of Tirzah Garwood: Beyond Ravilious, while across the Channel at the Pompidou Centre, they'll be taking down the more substantial, very fleshy paintings of Suzanne Valadon.
Images
Utagawa Hiroshige (1797-1858), The Plum Garden at Kameido from 100 Famous Views of Edo, 1857, Collection of Alan Medaugh. © Alan Medaugh; Photo: Matsuba RyōkoSophie Mess, Burst, 2025
Suzanne Valadon (1865-1938), The Blue Room, 1923, Centre Pompidou, Paris
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