Books

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A problem for every problem: Mike Pepi on Art is a Problem

Joshua Decter’s book of essays raises questions it refuses to answer

It runs in the family: Shelley Rice on Alexander Nemerov’s family portrait

Diane Arbus and her brother, the poet Howard Nemerov, are the subject of a new memoir-cum-history

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A forgotten artist returns: George Morland’s work is at last acknowledged

Morland was an exceptional landscape painter and a great observer of social mores

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How was the Brancacci Chapel originally seen?

Florence’s early Renaissance showpiece revolutionised painting—but how was it seen, and used, at the time?

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Portrait of the jeering artist as a young gent: Alexander Adams on Francis Picabia

The artist’s conventional beginnings belie his artistic proclivity for mockery. By Alexander Adams

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Having fun with England’s prelates: Rosemary Horrox on the 'decorated' style

The mainstream Gothic architectural aesthetic was more fecund than any marginal “alternative”

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Not an easy name: Lelia Packer on the importance of Joachim Wtewael

The artist has been unfairly overlooked, but the major monograph accompanying a forthcoming show affirms his place among the finest Dutch masters

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Make it look like me: the Pygmalion complex across the ages

On the myriad meanings of Medieval speaking sculpture, artists’ models, mannequins and royalty in wax

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How Luca della Robbia melded music and sculpture in his organ loft

Luca’s panels require multi-sensory perception and 3D thought

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James Barry's secret bomb at the Society of Arts

The hidden meaning of his paintings series is revealed

‘You must guard your own henhouse and often from your own foxes’

Book trade calls for self-policing as library thefts are growing problem

There is no single, global art market

New book explores some of the myths of the international trade

Inside an unquiet mind

Essays on the critic and curator Lawrence Alloway give a minor figure too much credit

How little man-made boxes are used to capture bigger ones

Great architectural photographers have moved far beyond mere documentation

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A conceptual artist takes on his critics

Artist and teacher Michael Craig-Martin’s insightful and entertaining memoir provides sage advice to younger artists

The messiah complex is no coincidence

Bearded and berobed figures inspired artists including Schiele and Beuys

Cliché and a lack of feeling: Richard Shiff explains why critics have failed painting

Painting lives on, but the critical terms stagnate and slacken, the art historian says

Artnews

Age of enlightenment: the religious power of Hagia Sophia

Lyn Rodley considers the relationship between Byzantine theology and the Great Church

Artnews

Brian Sewell travels across India—with a donkey

Anna Somers Cocks is charmed by the story of Mr B, accompanied by a donkey and a stout umbrella

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The ultimate dynamic duo: a new monograph surveys Nicola and Giovanni Pisano

David Ekserdjian learns more from a monumental monograph on father and son

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Horns offer plenty in the Middle Ages

An exhaustive survey of medieval elephant ivories raises the question of what is the best way to convey complex information, says Jane Jakeman

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High production value: how the Bohun manuscripts were made

The Bohun manuscripts demonstrate how illuminated manuscripts were produced, says David King

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The powerful presence of Rubens in every age

Theodore K. Rabb looks at the Flemish artist’s “legacy” over nearly four centuries

The art of the teacher: on the work of Hans Hofmann

The artist at last gets the recognition it deserves, says Alexander Adams