When we visit the Netherlands or come across the Dutch abroad, we always feel they know how to relax and enjoy life. Visit Museum De Lakenhal in Leiden and you'll see in their latest exhibition that this joie de vivre has a long tradition. The gallery is looking back 400 years to the birth in the city of Jan Steen, who frequently painted his countrymen having a good time. And yes, on occasion, perhaps just a little bit too much of a good time. In this show, At Home with Jan Steen -- 400 Years of Merrymaking , you will discover why the Dutch use the expression "a Jan Steen household" for a home where, well, things are maybe just a bit too free and easy. This is the painting that sums it up: What a jolly time everyone is having in The Merry Family . To the accompaniment of music, they are indeed making merry: singing, drinking and smoking. All are taking part; the old, the young, and even a baby wielding a spoon. The baby's not partaking of the alcohol or tobacco, adm...
It's a beguiling, entrancing landscape, yet somehow also very reassuring. The year is 1918, and John Nash is back in England after many months of service on the Western Front in World War I, one of the few survivors from his company. While working by day on paintings to commemorate the conflict as an official war artist, in the evening he's able to leave the memories of the slaughter behind to work for himself, on pictures that purged the horror of the trenches. This is The Cornfield , and it's probably the stand-out painting in a really outstanding exhibition at Towner Eastbourne, John Nash: The Landscapes of Love and Solace , the first retrospective devoted to the life and work of the artist, the less well-known younger brother of Paul Nash, in more than half a century. You can see in this painting a fascination with shapes, patterns and shadows that characterises the best of Nash's landscapes: the angular forms of the row of corn sheaves, their edges highlighted by t...