We’re nearing the end of November now, and men even in the most remote corners of the office block are sporting startling moustaches. “Movember,” the month-long annual event in support of men’s health awareness, is now in its ninth year and going strong. Still, no matter how many guys participate, there’s one moustache we just … Continue reading
Good old Alois Senefelder. It might be easy to overlook him in the grand sweep of art history. After all, he wasn’t exactly an artist himself, but if it weren’t for him, we might never have seen any of the following works: All of the images above are lithographs — prints made using limestone. Senefelder … Continue reading
In the southwest corner of Britain, where the temperatures are mild and the light is clear and good for painting, there is a town called St Ives. Originally a fishing village, the town rose to international fame in the first half of the twentieth century as artists from England and beyond arrived there to work. … Continue reading
To start a discussion of the German artist Emil Nolde, I think we could all use a simile. I expect many of you organize your dresser drawers into categories. And if you do, I bet you also have one item that defies classification. For me it’s my one belt. “Thematically,” I’ll think to myself in … Continue reading
Guest Entry by Edward Spencer Many people have posed the age old question: “what is the opposite of an art historian?” Well, one of the clear frontrunners would have to be a geologist. Therefore, I am shocked to tell you that is what I am (as simplified here by Gustav Courbet, 1849). Therefore, although my … Continue reading
When it comes to modern art, it can be easy to feel that someone’s having a laugh at your expense. Whether it’s the works themselves or opaque explanations given in gallery labels, art of the last 150 years seems to be the ever-shrinking domain of only the most extensively trained and deeply initiated. Will Gompertz … Continue reading
Before the Art 