The latest news and comment on the Royal Academy of Arts
September 2024
Michael Craig-Martin review – sorry, but these lamps and filing cabinets just aren’t that interesting
His early conceptual work inspired the likes of Damien Hirst, but the RA has inexplicably focused on his cool and clinical representations of the ordinary stuff of modern life
‘I have taken risks, but Damien is a staggering risk-taker’: Michael Craig-Martin on style, the YBAs and being the great late bloomer of British art
Ahead of a major retrospective at the Royal Academy, the veteran artist and mentor to Hirst, Lucas et al talks about his nomadic early years, halcyon days at Goldsmiths – and the moment he stopped being ‘frightened’ of colour
Frederic Leighton’s only known painting of moon over water to go on show after being lost for a century
Painter’s Bay of Cadiz, Moonlight, bought by Leighton House Museum in June, will star in November exhibition
August 2024
On my radar
On my radar: Zadie Smith’s cultural highlights
The writer on Netflix’s brilliant plague tragicomedy, the best British debut novel she’s read in a while, and her deep love of singer Chappell Roan
July 2024
Who’s on the 2024 RA Dorfman prize shortlist? A lingerie factory turned weekend home, Ukrainian volunteer roofers – and more
The four disparate projects shortlisted for the annual prize add up to a heartening display of style, beauty, collaboration and force-for-good ambition
Brief letters
What is art for, if not for political discourse
Brief letters: Young artists at Royal Academy | Holly berries | Whale strandings | Elastic band use | Wrap it up | Dearth of film canisters
Royal Academy removes Gaza-inspired works after Jewish group flags concerns
In the Eye of the Storm: Modernism in Ukraine, 1900-1930s review – a small yet blazing act of solidarity
‘I took it personally’: Rejects, the show for artists rebuffed by the Royal Academy
June 2024
‘A show you want to pick up and fondle’: Assemble electrify the RA’s Summer Exhibition
The architecture room of the Royal Academy’s annual event has been turned into a mesmerising ‘museum of making’ by the Turner-prize winners, full of intriguing insights and mind-boggling exhibits
Royal Academy Summer Exhibition review – a gasping death-rattle of conservative mediocrity
Pampered pets, polite portraits and enough wan landscapes to fill a field – this show mirrors the numbed, aimless condition of Britain after 14 years of Tory misrule
‘I don’t know if I like it’: artist finally shown at Royal Academy after 31 attempts
Alison Aye’s work will be seen alongside 481 other new exhibitors at the Summer Exhibition
April 2024
The Guardian view on the Royal Academy: reframing a bloody past
Editorial: The Royal Academy is examining the part it has played in Britain’s history of slavery and empire – and the usual carping suspects will not be pleased
March 2024
The great women's art bulletin
Why does Cleopatra always have to die nude? Male titillaters – and the artist who stood against them
From Medusa to Circe, novelists have scored hits with feminist reimaginings of Greek myths and historical figures. But Swiss-born painter Angelica Kauffman beat them to it – by 250 years
Notebook
TalkTV’s natural home was never going to be on television
Tomiwa Owolade
The station’s move online will cater for die-hard viewers who want to watch its content wherever they can
Angelica Kauffman; Sargent and Fashion review – appearance is all
More defiant in life than in her smooth, theatrical art, one of the co-founders of the RA finally gets a show of her own. And gents and ladies dress to thrill for flashy, riveting John Singer Sargent
February 2024
A colossal artistic joke – Flaming June at the Royal Academy review
Entangled Pasts: Art, Colonialism and Change review – the most radical show in the RA’s history
January 2024
Entangled Pasts 1768-Now review – RA all at sea with its risk-light colonial revisionism
‘We’re artists, not boxes to be ticked’: Lubaina Himid on her call to arms – and exposing Bath’s past
The great women's art bulletinWhy does Cleopatra always have to die nude? Male titillaters – and the artist who stood against themFrom Medusa to Circe, novelists have scored hits with feminist reimaginings of Greek myths and historical figures. But Swiss-born painter Angelica Kauffman beat them to it – by 250 years
