The Bayeux Tapestry exhibition at the British Museum starts on September 10; it's already sold out for this year but booking for the rest of the run, from January 1 through to July 11, will open on October 21. If you've never seen this most breathtaking of historical artefacts, you may want to seize the chance before it leaves London next year for its permanent home in Normandy, which will have been renovated during its absence. At Southampton City Art Gallery, we're promised an extensive exhibition of British art from the first half of the 20th century, drawing on the museum's own substantial holdings and those of the Ingram Collection . Running from September 26 to February 21, Art Then! British Painting, Sculpture and Drawing, 1910-1960 will feature artists including Barbara Hepworth, Gwen John , Paul Nash and Eric Ravilious. There might not be much new on in London this month, but we'll always have Paris. Starting at the Musée Jacquemart-André with Time...
Mickey Mouse and rococo frippery -- it's not an obvious connection. But a visit to Inspiring Walt Disney: The Animation of French Decorative Arts at the Wallace Collection in London shows just how much the classic cartoon films produced by the pioneer of movie animation were influenced by the art and design of 18th-century France. Disney first went to France just after the end of World War I, as a Red Cross ambulance driver. Back in the US, he and his brother Roy founded their studio in 1923, and in 1935 the Disneys returned to France during a grand tour. A home movie early in this exhibition records the Disney family as tourists in Paris and Versailles, soaking up the architecture, and the decor. As a holiday memento, Walt took back to California more than 300 illustrated books to form the nucleus of a research library that's provided source material for Disney movies ever since. The Wallace presents a selection of those films -- and a lot of preparatory artwork...