There are some familiar names and familiar paintings in Art Then! British Painting, Sculpture and Drawing, 1910-1960 at Southampton City Art Gallery, but it's the unfamiliar that makes it especially worth the trip to a venue you might not normally consider for an exhibition. This show provides an excellent overview of art trends in this country in the first half of the 20th century. And it's free! Southampton has a very good collection, but we often get the feeling that a lot of interesting works are in store behind closed doors. Pleasant surprises await when they finally see the light of the day, in this case in combination with a selection from the extensive Ingram Collection of modern British art. In all, there are more than 100 works by over 100 artists, demonstrating how the British reacted to the latest developments in art on the Continent. So let's start with a couple of hidden gems from the Southampton treasure trove, first of all a Landscape that really stoppe...
The exhibitions of Leonardo da Vinci drawings from the Royal Collection at 12 galleries around the UK are drawing such crowds that they are set to break attendance records. The show marking the 500th anniversary of Leonardo's death at the Millennium Gallery in Sheffield has produced a "fantastic response", Museums Sheffield said this week. "In the first 19 days since we opened we’ve welcomed over 25,000 visitors through the doors, which sets it on track to become the Millennium Gallery’s most popular exhibition ever." Glasgow's Kelvingrove Art Gallery reported the highest daily attendance figures of the eight museums that responded to our inquiries. It saw 18,408 visitors in the first 12 days after the displays opened simultaneously around the country on February 1. Liverpool's Walker Art Gallery also reported more than 1,150 visitors a day, with a cumulative total of 19,603 by February 17. The Ulster Museum in Belfast reported 16,576 visitor...