fri 31/10/2025

Visual Arts Reviews

'We are bowled over!' Thank you for your messages of love and support

Tom Birchenough

We are bowled over! 

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Photo Oxford 2025 review - photography all over the town

Bill Knight

Photo Oxford 2025 presents a programme of exhibitions, lectures and events ranging from well-known artists and documentary photographers to new talent, spread over the town at 26 venues in colleges, galleries and bookshops. In a way this is reminiscent of the rencontres de la photographie at Arles. Unlike at Arles however, admission is free and the weather is less sunny.

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Gilbert & George, 21st Century Pictures, Hayward Gallery review - brash, bright and not so beautiful

Sarah Kent

There was a time when Gilbert & George made provocative pictures that probed the body politic for sore points that others preferred to ignore. Trawling the streets of East London, where they’ve lived since the 1960s, the artist duo chronicled the poverty and squalor of their neighbourhood in large photographic panels that feature the angry, the debased and the destitute.

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Lee Miller, Tate Britain review - an extraordinary career that remains an enigma

Sarah Kent

Tate Britain’s Lee Miller retrospective begins with a soft focus picture of her by New York photographer Arnold Genthe dated 1927, when she was working as a fashion model. The image is so hazy that she appears as dreamlike and insubstantial as a wraith.

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Kerry James Marshall: The Histories, Royal Academy review - a triumphant celebration of blackness

Sarah Kent

This must be the first time a black artist has been honoured with a retrospective that fills the main galleries of the Royal Academy. Celebrating Kerry James Marshall’s 70th birthday, The Histories occupies these grand rooms with such joyous ease and aplomb that it makes one forget how rare it is for blackness to be given centre stage.

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Folkestone Triennial 2025 - landscape, seascape, art lovers' escape

Mark Sheerin

A rare cloud form envelopes the headland and to the east and the west Folkestone is cut off from the known world. This mist shortens the visual range, drawing attention to the chalky soil, the sea gorse and the looping swifts. It also softly frames 18 site specific works of contemporary art that work in sympathy with this historic settlement. Folkestone is, as the Triennial shows, rich in local inspiration. 

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Emily Kam Kngwarray, Tate Modern review - glimpses of another world

Sarah Kent

It took until the last room of her exhibition for me to gain any real understanding of the work of Australian Aboriginal artist Emily Kam Kngwarray. Given that Tate Modern’s retrospective of this highly acclaimed painter comprises some 80 paintings and batiks, the process had been slow!

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Kiefer / Van Gogh, Royal Academy review - a pairing of opposites

Sarah Kent

When he was a callow youth of 18, German artist Anselm Keifer got a travel grant to follow in the footsteps of his idol, Vincent van Gogh. Some sixty years later, work by the two artists has been brought together at the Royal Academy in a show that highlights Van Gogh’s influence on his acolyte and invites you to compare and contrast.

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Jenny Saville: The Anatomy of Painting, National Portrait Gallery review - a protégé losing her way

Sarah Kent

When in the 1990s, Jenny Saville’s peers shunned painting in favour of alternative media such as photography, video and installations, the artist stuck to her guns and, unapologetically, worked on canvases as large as seven feet tall.

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Abstract Erotic, Courtauld Gallery review - sculpture that is sensuous, funny and subversive

Sarah Kent

The Courtauld Gallery’s Abstract Erotic is a delight for two reasons – because an institution that has often seemed locked in the past is now embracing change and also because the sculptures on show are clever, suggestive and subversively funny.

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