Review | The (Ig)noble Sacrifice of the Author in Christian Petzold’s Afire by Blaise Radley
Blaise Radley The (Ig)noble Sacrifice of the Author in Christian Petzold’s Afire Literary history is littered with so-called troubled…
Review | Hilma af Klint & Piet Mondrian: Forms of Life by Liam Peress
Liam Peress Hilma af Klint & Piet Mondrian: Forms of Life Abstract art. A phrase that seems to confuse and…
Review | The Meaning of Sex by Stuart Walton
Stuart Walton The Meaning of Sex Sad Love: Romance and the Search for Meaning, Carrie Jenkins, Polity, pp.200, 2022, £14.99…
Review | Young Rembrandt & Nicolaes Maes: Dutch Master of the Golden Age
The similarities between the life paths of the 17th century Dutch painters Nicolaes Maes (1634-1693) and Rembrandt (1606-1669) are intriguing. Both grew up in small town Holland, both were apprenticed to local painters at an early age, both moved to Amsterdam to work with a master, both returned to their home towns to perfect their own style, both ended their lives in Amsterdam to which each had returned as their careers began to burgeon […]
Review | Bridget Riley: The Eye’s Mind
Bridget Riley didn’t invent Op Art. The phrase first appeared in Time Magazine in 1964 in response to Julian Stanczak’s exhibition Optical Paintings. Defined as a form that uses visual trickery to challenge perception, it was a natural successor to Futurism, Constructivism, Vorticism and even Dadaism, liberated by Impressionism. But Riley made it what it is now […]
Review | Orient London – A sizzle above the rest
Steven O’Brien Orient London – A sizzle above the rest We were off to see the vast brocade of the…
Dido and Aeneas by Jeffrey Meyers
Autumn in Venice: Ernest Hemingway and His Last Muse, Andrea di Robilant, Atlantic Books, 348 pp. £17.99 (hardback). Andrea di…
Review | The Snowman at The Peacock Theatre
This Christmas, join the Birmingham Repertory Theatre in their magical rendition of Raymond Brigg’s The Snowman. Christmas would not be…
Review | Modern Couples: Art, Intimacy and the Avant-garde at The Barbican
The centrifugal drive behind much of the work featured in the Barbican’s new exhibition Modern Couples: Art, Intimacy and the Avant-garde is enunciated by Rodin in the first gallery: ‘I express in a loud voice what all artists think. Desire! Desire! What a formidable stimulant.’
Interview | Cradeaux Alexander
American video and performance artist Cradeaux Alexander presents a mid-career retrospective this month at Bow Arts, London. Jemima Walter met…
Review | Promising Young Women by Caroline O’Donoghue
This year has truly brought to the fiction scene some of the most stunning and powerful female characters. From the…
Charles Dibdin – Christmas Gambols
Charles Dibdin (1745-1814) has a strong claim to be Britain’s first pop star. He became famous as a performer in…
The Threepenny Opera
If you put on a production of Romeo and Juliet in Verona, how much does anyone care that the action…
A Strangeness in My Mind by Orhan Pamuk
A Strangeness in My Mind by Orhan Pamuk I was reading Orhan Pamuk’s Snow in London recently, when a Scottish man stopped me…
The Lobster
The Lobster If you were to be turned into an animal what animal would you choose? This question remains at…
40 Sonnets by Don Paterson
Paterson is at his best when writing about heartbreak. “The Six,” this reviewer’s favourite piece in 40 Sonnets, speaks…
The Heart Goes Last by Margaret Atwood
The Heart Goes Last by Margaret Atwood In 2009, Ursula K. Le Guin caused something of a stir in the…
The New World by Chris Adrian & Eli Horowitz
The New World Chris Adrian & Eli Horowitz Granta, £12.99 (paperback) The New World opens grippingly by immersing the reader…
Undermajordomo Minor by Patrick DeWitt
Undermajordomo Minor by Patrick DeWitt ‘Cheerily, then, as one making teatime conversation, she asked “do you yourself ever think of…
The Heart Goes Last by Margaret Atwood
The Heart Goes Last Margaret Atwood Bloomsbury, £18.99 Reworked from an e-serial, Atwood’s latest novel is as captivating and humorous…
Purity by Jonathan Franzen
Jonathan Franzen likes big books. Each one of his critically acclaimed works are weighty door-stoppers but their tangible size in…
In the Belly of a Beast – The Serpentine Pavilion
On the 25th June The Serpentine Pavilion unveiled its much-anticipated 15th annual commission, this time appointed to young Spanish architects José Selgas…
Where my Heart Used to Beat by Sebastian Faulks
Where my Heart Used to Beat by Sebastian Faulks In Where My Heart Used to Beat, we witness the transformation…
The First Bad Man by Miranda July
The First Bad Man by Miranda July Cheryl Glickman — isolated, alone and with no true friends to speak of…
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