The Art Exhibitions Blog

August is always one of the quietest months for new exhibitions, and this year is no different, but we do have one big event to alert you to, as well as two splendid shows that only have weeks to run.  The one major opening is  Gwen John: Strange Beauties  at the National Galleries of Scotland in Edinburgh. Running from August 1 to January 4, this is a comprehensive retrospective of the work of the woman perhaps now seen as Wales's most significant artist, born 150 years ago this year. Maybe a little too comprehensive, according to some of the reviews of the show when it was on at the National Museum in Cardiff. The exhibition goes on to the Yale Center for British Art in New Haven, Connecticut, in February and then at the end of July next year to the National Museum of Women in the Arts in Washington DC. We saw a rather smaller Gwen John exhibition in Chichester in 2023.  Last chance to see.... Ending on August 23 is the exhibition at the Lakenhal in Leiden ...

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...

Here in England, you can visit a car showroom again from June 1, but if you're hoping to get out to see some art during the month, it looks like you'll need to be on the European mainland. Museums across the Netherlands are reopening at the start of June, and one exhibition we can thoroughly recommend is George Stubbs -- The Man, The Horse, The Obsession at the Mauritshuis in The Hague, which is being extended through to August 30. Find out how, in the 18th century, Stubbs was able to produce portraits of horses of unparalleled realism and get the chance to admire Whistlejacket , his most famous work and one of the jewels of London's National Gallery. We saw a bigger, broader version of this show last year at the MK Gallery in Milton Keynes and loved it . Dutch museums will initially be operating at reduced capacity to allow for social distancing, and you need to book online tickets in advance to visit, specifying a timeslot for entry, though there's no need to we...

There have been a lot of Rembrandt exhibitions last year and in 2019, the 350th anniversary of his death, and we've felt a wee bit satiated, to be perfectly truthful.  The last big show in the Netherlands in this celebratory Rembrandt year is in Leiden, the city where the great artist was born in 1606, at the newly renovated and extended Museum De Lakenhal. It's about the start of his career, the period before Rembrandt really became Rembrandt. We approached it with a slight degree of trepidation; would this assembly of apprentice works actually constitute a decent exhibition?  We needn't have been concerned.  Young Rembrandt -- Rising Star  turns out to be the best Rembrandt show of all those we've seen recently, and in fact the best of the dozens of exhibitions we've been to around Europe this year. And if you can't get to Leiden, it'll be transferring to the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford in February.  This show takes us through to about 1634-35...

There's a blockbuster of an exhibition about to open in London on November 2: Tutankhamun -- Treasures of the Golden Pharaoh at the Saatchi Gallery. Of more than 150 artefacts on show from the Egyptian king's tomb, unearthed almost a century ago, 60 are leaving Egypt for a first and final time on a world tour before they return to be displayed in a new Grand Egyptian Museum. The show's just been to Paris, where it drew almost 1.5 million visitors. It's on in London until May 3. Tickets are, as you might expect, not cheap. Five hundred years after the death of Leonardo da Vinci, the National Gallery is offering visitors an immersive exhibition designed to reveal the secrets of his painting The Virgin of the Rocks , taking you from inside the artist's mind (!) to how the picture might have looked in its original setting. Leonardo: Experience a Masterpiece opens on November 9 and runs until January 12. We'll be expecting something a little less hi-tech from ...

A couple of big anniversaries dominate the 2019 exhibition calendar: It's 500 years since Leonardo da Vinci's death, and 350 since Rembrandt's. Van Gogh is celebrated in two major shows, while Bridget Riley and Antony Gormley are among the leading contemporary artists in focus. Here's a look at some of the standout dates for the diary in 2019, in more or less chronological order. January The first big show of the New Year comes at Tate Modern in London, with Pierre Bonnard: The Colour of Memory opening on January 23. The Tate is promising 100 of Bonnard's greatest works from museums and private collections around the world. Until May 6. To mark Rembrandt Year in the Netherlands, the Mauritshuis in The Hague is putting on show all of the 18 paintings in its collection that are by Rembrandt or have been attributed to him. January 31 to September 15. February Leonardo da Vinci: A Life in Drawing will see drawings by Leonardo in the Royal Collection exhibite...