Skip to main content

New Exhibitions in June

Frida Kahlo: Now, there's a name to be reckoned with. More than just a painter, a global phenomenon, a superstar who died too young. And so coming to Tate Modern on June 25 we have  Frida: The Making of an Icon , surely set to be one of the most in-demand tickets in London this year. It's not so much a show about Frida, though, as about the cult of Frida: More than 30 of her works are accompanied by some 200 by contemporaries and those from later generations whom she inspired, and then there are over 200 objects exploring "Fridamania". The show had good reviews when it was on at the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston, and you've got until January 3 to catch it at the Tate.  While we're on the subject of mid 20th-century female icons whose candle burned out long before their legend ever did....  Marilyn Monroe: A Portrait  starts at the National Portrait Gallery on June 4. The Hollywood star would have been 100 years old this year, and this show, running until Sept...
Post a Comment

Subscribe to updates

Opening in May

Shape of Light is the title of the new show that Tate Modern says aims to tell the intertwined stories of photography and abstract art for the first time. Man Ray and Alfred Stieglitz are among the pioneering photographers featured from May 2 to October 14.

At the Royal Academy, the third of Tacita Dean's three spring shows at major London museums opens on May 19. This one focuses on Landscape and runs to August 12. The two others -- Portrait at the National Portrait Gallery and Still Life at the National Gallery -- can be seen until May 28.

Edward Bawden, perhaps best known as an illustrator and graphic artist, is the subject of a wide-ranging retrospective at Dulwich Picture Gallery that's also intended to champion his work as a fine artist, including innovative watercolours in the 1930s. It's on from May 23 to September 9, following on from Dulwich's excellent David Milne show.
The Guildhall Art Gallery in the City of London focuses on William De Morgan, described as "the most intriguing and inventive ceramic designer of the late Victorian period". Sublime Symmetry, a free exhibition, runs from May 11 to October 28.

The Museum of London Docklands looks at how the Londoners of 2,000 years ago buried their loved ones, with a sarcophagus newly discovered in Southwark on display for the first time. Roman Dead starts on May 25 and is on till October 28, and there's again no charge to see it.

Bringing things bang up to date, the V&A looks at 100 projects shaping the world of tomorrow from smart appliances to satellites. The Future Starts Here starts there on May 12 and ends on November 4.

The Pallant in Chichester celebrates the work of female artists in a show inspired by the writings of Virginia Woolf that was well reviewed when it was first on at Tate St Ives at the beginning of this year. Barbara Hepworth, Gwen John, Vanessa Bell and Laura Knight are among the 80 women featured from May 26 to September 16. The exhibition then travels to the Fitzwilliam in Cambridge.
Prized Possessions is the title of the new exhibition at the Holburne Museum in Bath, featuring Dutch paintings from National Trust houses by artists including Rembrandt, Cuyp and ter Borch. Running from May 25 to September 16, this seems set to be a quality show, not least because it moves on to the Mauritshuis in The Hague later this year. There's another chance to see it at Petworth in spring 2019.
In Eastbourne, the Towner marks the 100th anniversary of the death of Edward Stott, "the poet-painter of the twilight". His atmospheric depictions of rural scenes are being brought together for the first time in more than four decades from May 26 to September 16.

Back in St Ives, the Tate's summer show is devoted to the vibrant abstract paintings of Patrick Heron in a retrospective spanning the second half of the 20th century that gets under way on May 19 and will be on till September 30.

One highlight on the Continent is a 130-work show in Denmark covering the career of Gabriele Münter, whose saturated-colour landscapes and portraits belie the Angst-ridden image of German Expressionism. It's on at the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art north of Copenhagen from May 3 to August 19. You might not think the Danish capital the most obvious destination for art-lovers, but it's actually got a fantastic array of galleries to visit.

Images

Edward Bawden, Untitled Landscape with Sunset, 1927, Private Collection. (c) Estate of Edward Bawden
Dame Laura Knight, The Dark Pool, 1908-1918, Laing Art Gallery, Newcastle. (c) Reproduced with permission of the Estate of Dame Laura Knight DBE RA 2018. All rights reserved
Gerard ter Borch, An Officer Making His Bow to a Lady, c. 1662, Polesden Lacey, Surrey. (c) National Trust Images/John Hammond

Edwar
d Bawden,
Untitled landscape with
sunset
, 19
27
,
watercolour
on paper
, Private
Collection,
© Estate of Edward Bawden
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

What's On in 2026

Coming up in 2026: Lots more big exhibitions starring women artists, including Frida Kahlo, Leonor Fini, Leonora Carrington and Gwen John , as well as a host of names from the 17th-century Low Countries. And women almost certainly embroidered the Bayeux Tapestry, a contender for this year's hottest ticket in London.   Here's a selection of shows that have caught our eye around Britain and Europe, in more or less chronological order; as ever, we make no claim to comprehensiveness, and our choice very much reflects our personal taste. January We'll start the year at the Fondation Beyeler on the outskirts of Basel, where they're devoting an exhibition to Paul Cezanne . Focusing on the artist's later years, the show will bring together some 80 oil paintings and watercolours. January 25 to May 25.  February Two leading British women artists feature in exhibitions opening this month, with the National Museum in Cardiff honouring the best-known female painter Wales has pr...
1 comment
Read more

Carrington: You've Met Leonora, Now Discover Dora

Carrington: She only wanted to be known by her surname, unwittingly posing a conundrum for art historians, curators and the wider world a century later.  Because it's another somewhat later Carrington, the long-lived Surrealist and totally unrelated, who's recently become Britain's most expensive woman artist. But today we're at Pallant House Gallery in Chichester to see an exhibition not about Leonora but about Dora Carrington. She hated that name Dora -- so Victorian -- but with Leonora so much in the limelight (and the subject of a  recent show at Newlands House in Petworth, just a few miles up the road), the curators at the Pallant didn't have much option, so they've had to call their retrospective  Dora Carrington: Beyond Bloomsbury .  Leonora was a bit of a rebel, as we found out in Petworth. Dora too. But we ought to respect her wish. Carrington, then, has been a bit neglected recently; this is the first show of her works in three decades. And while ther...
Post a Comment
Read more

The Highs and Lows of the Nahmad Collection

It's widely referred to as the world's most valuable private art collection : the one assembled over decades by the Nahmad brothers, dealers Ezra and David . Worth an estimated $3 billion or more, it's said to include hundreds of Picassos. Some 60 works from it are now on display at the Musée des impressionnismes in Giverny as  The Nahmad Collection: From Monet to Picasso . Intended, apparently, to demonstrate how art developed from the early 19th century through Impressionism and on to the start of the modern era, towards the liberation of colour and form, this is an exhibition that ends up coming across as somewhat incoherent. We're not really told much about the Nahmads or their collecting choices -- and as you search the Internet, things become slightly mysterious: Is Ezra alive or dead? The art, presumably, is supposed to speak for itself, but it's a rather eclectic, if not confusing, selection; some of the works are fantastic, some are distinctly ho-hum.  Let...
Post a Comment
Read more