The French painter Auguste Renoir continues to divide critical opinion, something acknowledged by the curators of the new exhibition, Renoir and Love, at the National Gallery in London. But he remains enormously popular: the Gallery announced ahead of the show that it had broken records for advanced ticket sales. So what does the exhibition tell us about Renoir’s place in the radical developments in art in Paris between the 1860s and 1880s? Ben Luke visits the National Gallery to talk to Chiara di Stefano, its co-curator.
Renoir's Oarsmen at Chatou (1879)
© National Gallery of Art, Washington, Gift of Sam A. Lewisohn
In Belgium, the long-awaited Kanal Brussels, the museum of modern and contemporary art and architecture, established and funded by the Brussels-Capital Region and housed in a spectacular former Citroën garage, has become a political football, with debates over its future funding. Ben speaks to Senay Boztas, The Art Newspaper’s correspondent based in Amsterdam, about the latest developments.
Kanal will open in Brussels on 28 November
© Bart Grietens
And this episode’s Work of the Week is Seated Sarong Figure (1938) by Ronald Moody. The work features in an exhibition at Orleans House Gallery in Twickenham, London, called Sculpting Life. Ben talks to the artist and curator Kedisha Coakley, who has made a new film about Moody for the exhibition.
Ronald Moody's Seated Sarong Figure (1938)
© Wakefield Permanent Art Collection (The Hepworth Wakefield); Photo: Anna Bridson
- Renoir and Love, National Gallery, London, 3 October-31 January 2027; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, 20 February-13 June 2027
- Kanal Brussels opens 28 November
- Ronald Moody: Sculpting Life, Orleans House Gallery, London, 2 October-28 February 2027; Kedisha Coakley’s film premieres at the gallery on 30 October