The Snowman has become an integral part of the British Christmas, with its come-to-life hero taking a small dressing-gowned boy for an adventure Walking in the Air . It's a 20th-century equivalent of Charles Dickens's tale of Ebenezer Scrooge, Bob Cratchit and Tiny Tim. When The Snowman 's creator, Raymond Briggs, applied to go to art school at the age of 15, his interviewer was horrified to hear that he wanted to be a cartoonist. Today, he might be even more horrified to find out about Bloomin' Brilliant: The Life and Work of Raymond Briggs at the Ditchling Museum of Art + Craft in East Sussex. Briggs, who died two years ago, lived just a mile down the road from Ditchling, in the shadow of the South Downs. This joyful celebratory show looks back on a 60-year career that also gave us Fungus the Bogeyman , Father Christmas , When the Wind Blows and the story of his parents, Ethel and Ernest . Cartoons, picture books, graphic novels, for children perhaps, but actual
It's the month before Christmas, and all through the house, there's not a lot stirring in terms of new exhibitions. At the Wallace Collection in London, December 4 sees the opening of Forgotten Masters: Indian Painting for the East India Company . Curated by writer and historian William Dalrymple , this is the first show in the UK of works by Indian painters for the trading company that effectively ruled large parts of the subcontinent in the 18th and 19th centuries. Until April 19. We've seen some superb exhibitions at the Kunsthalle in Hamburg in the past, and their new show brings together three really big names: Goya, Fragonard, Tiepolo . With around 100 works, the exhibition will examine the disparity of 18th-century art in an age of great political, technological and social change. December 13 to April 13. And in Italy, the Palazzo dei Diamanti in Ferrara is devoting a show to Giuseppe De Nittis , the Italian painter closely associated with the French Impressio