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 ...
Football: shared memories of great players, the not-so-great players who fouled them, World Cups, triumphs, near-misses and disasters; more personal recollections of muddy school pitches, away trips to grounds in the back of beyond, pools wins and Subbuteo. Football: Designing the Beautiful Game at the Design Museum in London brings it all flooding back. No dry display, this, as you might fear, of how the equipment and stadiums of the world's most popular sport have been optimised and marketed down the years; it's a show that pulls you in and holds your interest through the full 90 minutes and into extra time. Top-level soccer these days is such a slick, modern entertainment product, you can easily forget the way it used to be. The curators take you right back to the game's Victorian beginnings: A Harrow School ball looks more like a pouffe -- it's easier to imagine sitting on it than kicking it or heading it -- while the heavy leather boots of the type w...