How crazy was Louis Wain?
Before Tom Kitten, before Felix the Cat, before Thomas ‘Tom’ Cat, Sylvester James Pussycat Sr, Top Cat and Fat Freddy’s…
The frisky side of a classical master: National Gallery's Poussin and the Dance reviewed
In the winter of 1861, visitors to the Louvre might have seen a young artist painstakingly copying one of the…
The genius of Frans Hals
Since art auctions were invented, they have served to hype artists’ prices. It can happen during an artist’s lifetime —…
The art of the pillbox
Laura Gascoigne on the art of pillboxes
The magical art of boxer, labourer & sometime gravedigger Eric Tucker
Artists’ estates can be a curse on a family. The painter dies, leaving the house stuffed with unsold canvases. What…
Covid has been great for drawing
Amid the greatly exaggerated reports of the death of painting issued and reissued over the course of the past century,…
How has this complete original been sidelined?
A party of disorderly couples has gatecrashed the Picture Gallery at Bath’s Holburne Museum, climbing on to the antique furniture,…
Why is the smoky, febrile art of Marcelle Hanselaar so little known?
I first became aware of the work of Marcelle Hanselaar in a mixed exhibition at the Millinery Works in Islington.…
These rediscovered drawings by Hokusai are extraordinary
These rediscovered drawings by Hokusai point to him as the father of photography and modern animation, says Laura Gascoigne
Meet the woman who designed Britain's revolutionary road signs
Laura Gascoigne meets Margaret Calvert, the designer who dragged British signposting into the modern era
A high-end car-boot sale of the unconscious: Colnaghi’s Dreamsongs reviewed
In 1772 the 15-year-old Mozart wrote a one-act opera set, like The Magic Flute, in a dream world. Il sogno…
The mediums who pioneered abstract art
The mediumistic art of various cranks, crackpots and old dowagers is finally being taken seriously – and about time too, says Laura Gascoigne
Imagine being married to Stanley Spencer
It sometimes rains in Cookham. It rained all day when I visited the Stanley Spencer Gallery to see the exhibition…
Figurative painting is back – but how good is any of it?
An oxymoron is a clever gambit in an exhibition title. The Whitechapel Gallery’s Radical Figures: Painting in the New Millennium…
The artistic response to the pandemic has so far been mind-numbingly banal
Travelling around Latin America three years ago, Stephen Chambers was attracted by pharmacy signs with pictograms advertising treatments to illiterate…
I wish John Chamberlain was still around to crush this hideous toothpaste-blue Ferrari
For three months art lovers have had nothing but screens to look at. As one New York dealer complained to…
Europe's eye-popping first glimpse of the Americas
The earliest depictions of the Americas were eye-popping, and shaped European art, says Laura Gascoigne
The artist who left no physical record of her work
While locked-down galleries compete to keep their artists in the public eye — or ear — by uploading interview podcasts,…
How to succeed in sculpture (without being a man)
Whee-ooh-whee ya-ya-yang skrittle-skrittle skreeeek… Is it a space pod bearing aliens from Mars? No, it’s a podcast featuring aliens from…
The gloriously indecent life and art of Aubrey Beardsley
In seven short years, Aubrey Beardsley mastered the art of outrage. Laura Gascoigne on the gloriously indecent illustrations of a singular genius
Pyramids of piffle: Tate Britain’s British Baroque reviewed
British Baroque: it was never going to fly. Les rosbifs emulating the splendour of le Roi Soleil? Pas possible. Still,…
Dazzling and sex-fuelled: Picasso and Paper at the Royal Academy reviewed
Picasso collected papers. Not just sheets of the exotic handmade stuff — though he admitted being seduced by them —……
How capitalism killed sleep
What can you make a joke about these days? All the old butts of humour are off limits. No wonder…
The enduring allure of ‘er indoors
‘She’s only a bird in a gilded cage, a beautiful sight to see. You may think she’s happy and free…
Why did Mrs Lowry hate her son’s paintings?
‘I often wonder what artists are for nowadays, what with photography and a thousand and one processes by which you…
