Author: the editor

Dark Clouds On The Horizon

NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021 Concern has been expressed from museums that visitors are not returning quickly enough following recent extended closures. No wonder if the main galleries in Manchester are typical of the rest. At the Whitworth and City Art Galleries, which although distinct institutions now share the same director, activists have replaced curators and scholarship has… Continue reading Dark Clouds On The Horizon

The Mound In Your Pocket

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER, 2021 I took a wrong turn on my bike recently near Russell Square and came upon Wallis Gilbert’s 1931 Daimler car hire garage in Herbrand Street. Set back almost hidden, and only yards from where I attended university, I had never suspected its existence. It now pleases me so much I regularly detour past… Continue reading The Mound In Your Pocket

2020 Blindness

MARCH/APRIL 2021 Nothing much happened last year in the visual arts. The usual suspects promoted themselves with yards of trivia, usually about the NHS, but nothing serious was made except by those conventional sorts who go quietly about their business. National galleries tried to fill the gap by selling us ‘virtual’ and ‘digital’ ‘experiences’ by… Continue reading 2020 Blindness

Martin Lang: Against life drawing

Advocating life drawing at art school is a deeply conservative and reactionary position. Arguments in favour of life drawing usually fall into one of two camps (or sometimes both). I am utterly unconvinced by both. The first, and weaker, argument contends that it is necessary to learn the rules before you can break them. This… Continue reading Martin Lang: Against life drawing

Art: Cool and Uncool – William Varley Reviews Addicted to Sheep

So, as all cool sentences begin, I think that the best TV programme I saw last was Addicted to Sheep. In many ways this BBC4 documentary was reminiscent of the French film Être et Avoir about a remarkable teacher in a school in the remote Auvergne, although a good deal less winsome. It focused on… Continue reading Art: Cool and Uncool – William Varley Reviews Addicted to Sheep

Charles Thomson: Lies, Damned Lies and Serota at the BBC

Sir Nicholas Serota, director of the Tate Gallery, has used the platform of the BBC in a blatant attempt to deceive the nation. Either that or he is genuinely deluded himself. Both options render him unfit for major public office. He was confronted on Radio 4 programme The Reunion: Tate Modern on September 23rd by… Continue reading Charles Thomson: Lies, Damned Lies and Serota at the BBC

Essay: What Happened to Art Education?

Introduction Since its beginning, and until very recently, Fine Art education has been evolutionary. Received wisdom that the modus operandi of teaching art were static until being gradually upset in the decades after 1945 is an exaggeration. The objective to produce basic competence in practical skills in painting and sculpture was indeed a constant ambition,… Continue reading Essay: What Happened to Art Education?

Selby Whittingham: Tate Modern or Tate Theatre

A survey by the Office for National Statistics in May revealed that the British are changing their spending habits. Instead of filling our homes to the rafters with consumer durables and not-so-durables, we’re spending our spare cash on ‘experiences’, including recreation and, yes, culture. “People are interested in servicing a lifestyle rather than buying stuff,”… Continue reading Selby Whittingham: Tate Modern or Tate Theatre

Laura Gascoigne: The Art Police – November 2017

If you’re thinking of committing an art crime, now’s your moment. In June budgetary pressures forced the ‘temporary’ closure of the Met’s Art & Antiques Squad and the transfer of expert staff to the Grenfell Tower fire investigation, and there’s no knowing when, if ever, they’ll be back. So it’s bye-bye blue light, hello green… Continue reading Laura Gascoigne: The Art Police – November 2017