Things to do in London today

A hat in the shape of an upside-down shoe; a dress resembling an inside-out human body; embroidered jackets covered with gorgeous pink roses, sparkling zodiac symbols and vibrant vegetables. Elsa Schiaparelli made clothes that were as surprising as they were beautiful. The V&A has plundered the well of ingenuity that is Maison Schiaparelli in its latest landmark fashion exhibition – the first British exhibition dedicated to the Italian designer, who rose to fame in Paris between the World Wars – and there are some real treasures to be found.  With over 400 objects, including 100 ensembles and 50 artworks (by the likes of Salvador Dalí, Picasso and Man Ray), as well as accessories, jewellery, photographs, perfumes and an excellent collection of buttons, Schiaparelli: Fashion Becomes Art presents a deep dive into the fantastical and surreal world of the fashion house. Founded on Paris’ Place Vendôme in 1927, the exhibition spans the 1920s to the present day, showing glorious garments from Creative Director Daniel Roseberry, who has been at the helm since 2019.  Excitingly, many of Schiaparelli’s 20th-century creations appear astoundingly contemporary. Knits from 1927, some of the designer’s first works, are patterned with pretty bows that the TikTok girlies of today would die for. There’s also an incredible gold chainmail headdress which wouldn’t look amiss on Florence Pugh in Dune, or on a ‘medievalcore’ Pinterest board. A shirred form-fitting dress with a visible zip – a...

Awaken your inner child by delving into enchanted lands, magical creatures and timeless tales at the British Library’s interactive family-friendly exhibition. All the bangers from your childhood will be explored – from Goldilocks, to Aladdin – through books, artworks, interactive displays, theatrical design, story sharing spaces, costumes and activities. Opening in time for the Easter holidays, Fairy Tales is ideal for passing a few hours with the little’uns. 

For the past few years the Elephant Family, a wildlife conservation charity, has organised the Big Egg Hunt – a trail of giant eggs dotted throughout London, designed by some of the country’s foremost artists and designers. That’s not happening this Easter. Instead, there’s a parade of 21 colourful elephants over in Battersea Power Station. The elephants have been decorated by creatives such as Studio Phantasma and Patricia Collins. Download the art trail app and you can tick off each sculpture as you come across them, unlocking special offers from retailers at the site.  

Once, Hampton Court Palace was the stamping ground of tyrannical Tudor king Henry VIII. It's unclear whether he would have enjoyed Easter egg hunts: perhaps he would have decapitated anyone who tried to make him trek round the garden before he could eat his sweetmeats. But don't let that stop you from enjoying an Easter adventure with a gorgeous Tudor backdrop this spring. As you hunt for the Lindt Gold Bunnies that are dotted throughout the historic grounds, you can learn all about the legendary figures who have made their mark throughout the decades of this London landmark. The trail takes around 90 minutes and is self-led. Once you've found all the Lindt Gold Bunny statues, you'll be rewarded with your very own edible gold bunny (or non-chocolate treat). Suitable for kids aged between 3 and 12.

Southbank Centre's REPLAY: A Limitless Recycled Playground is a very fun place indeed. It was wildly popular with families last year, and now it's back for 2026 for under 12s to have an hour-long dose of interactive creative fun. Herd Theatre has colourful, interactive wonderland for kids to create and play in, full of with recycled materials ready for repurposing and making. The experience is accompanied by a score made of recycled sounds, as well as prompts to encourage kids and adults to play side by side.

Did you know that the samurai believed gender and sexuality were fluid, and that they practically invented the concept of being non-binary? Because I certainly didn’t. This progressive view was one of many riveting – and surprising – things I learned at the blockbuster Samurai exhibition at the British Museum.  You don’t have to be a history buff to find Samurai intriguing – I’m not a medieval period obsessive, but like a lot of Zillenials I am a big fan of all things Japanese. This exhibition of treasures from Nihon, therefore, understandably appealed to me, and I suspect this will be the case for anyone who has spent hours trawling the internet for the perfect santoku knife or vintage Comme des Garçons jacket. There’s a lot crammed into the exhibition, which outlines the past 1,000 years through 280 objects and pieces of digital media, following the rise of the samurai from fierce mercenaries in the 1100s, through to their reign as an aristocratic social class from the 1600s to the 1800s. Examining the enduring legacy of the Japanese warriors in the present day, Samurai illustrates how the image of the noble fighter has been mythologised, altered and co-opted over the years, sometimes for nefarious means (as seen in a chilling Nazi pamphlet promoting the relations between Japan and Germany).  an incredible selection of ornate helmets resemble sculptures more than headgear Many of the artefacts on display are stunning – from intricately decorated partition screens, to...

After a five-year-long world tour, this blockbuster exhibition on the ancient Egyptians is finally arriving in London. Ramses and the Pharaoh’s Gold will display 180 priceless treasures on loan from the Supreme Council of Antiquities, of which the pinnacle is the coffin of Ramses II, giving Londoners the chance to see an original sarcophagus here in the Big Smoke. Other gems on show will include gold masks,  silver coffins, animal mummies, amulets, jewellery and colossal sculptures. Although superficially sounding quite similar to the recent Tutankhamun immersive exhibition, this one seems a lot more based around Ancient artefacts, with none of the fanciful CGI frippery that’s come into fashion in the world of international touring exhibitions the last couple of years.

Enjoy a shipshape night of music on a gently-bobbing pontoon at St Katharine Docks’ Floating Jazz evenings, which offer laidback listening afternoons and gorgeous vistas over the water. Its Mother’s Day and Easter sessions will be packed full of performances from live musicians, including artist in residence Olivia Swann, who covers legendary female artists including Ella Fitzgerald, Julie London, Blossom Dearie, and Judy Garland. There are blankets available to keep warm, guests receive a complimentary glass of British sparkling wine from Nyetimber on arrival, and food is also available from seafood restaurant The Melusine. 

A rare London visit from spectacular immersive art company Architects of Air, Luminarium: Myriad is a gigantic installation for all ages that’s perfect for kids to tear around in and also perfect for adults to have a moment of awed contemplation at the world (the two things would seem to be slightly mutually exclusive). To be honest we’re a bit hazy on the size and shape of this thing, but it sounds cool: ‘visitors can wander through winding tunnels, soar beneath cavernous domes, and explore interconnected chambers full of radiant colour, created as natural light filters through translucent PVC walls’, we are told.

Richmond’s 17th-century Ham House and Garden is hosting an Easter egg hunt in the run up to – and across – Easter weekend, with a special trail taking you around the grounds. The trail was inspired by the British Civil Wars and features activities along the way for the whole family to take part in. Make your way around 10 game stations and find out by the end if you’ve managed to save Ham House. Even if you fail, you’ll still get bunny ears to wear and a yummy Easter egg to enjoy, with dairy, vegan and Free From options available.

You probably want to know about Sadie Sink. But first we must talk about the sure-to-be-divisive device in auteur director Robert Icke’s take on Romeo & Juliet.  It has what one might call Sliding Doors scenes, wherein we see pivotal moments play out differently to Shakespeare’s plot, before a blinding flash of light resets the scene and we see the story take its inexorable turn for the tragic.  At best they’re an effective way of countering the fact that the bleak end of Shakespeare’s romantic tragedy is only arrived at by a series of mind-boggling coincidences and mishaps. Hamlet, Macbeth, Othello… those guys were probably always going to die. The starcross’d lovers – nope, you can easily imagine a world where things worked out better for them, and in acknowledging this Icke elevates the plot’s sillier moments. However, these interventions are extraneous (it’s obviously not how the play is going to be performed in future) and he overplays his hand in a final scene that teeters on the mawkish. It would have made for a more elegant production if he’d left it be, but auteurs are gonna auteur. Sadie Sink then. The Stranger Things star is good. She’s very good. And indeed, one of the reasons the parallel universe stuff feels extraneous is that Icke’s cast is so spectacular that having a fiddly conceit gets in the way of them.  The party scene, in which Sink’s gawky Juliet and Noah Jupe’s puppyish Romeo set eyes on each other for the first time, is electric. Rather than go...

Les Liaisons Dangereuses – I think it’s French for ‘the sexy meetings’ – is a classic play, though I’m not convinced that’s the same as being a good one. Starting life in 1782 as an epistolary novel by Pierre Choderlos de Laclos, Christopher Hampton’s 1985 stage adaptation was a sensation, adapted into a hit 1988 film and clearly responsible for the ‘90s teen remake Cruel Intentions. It was always trashy, mind, and in a post-#MeToo world I’d say there are some hard questions to be asked about its titillating realpolitik.  Accepting all that, this is a pretty good production of it, as you’d expect from the great Marianne Elliott’s first show at the NT in over a decade, with a to die for cast headed by Lesley Manville and Aiden Turner.  The duo play callous, capricious, above all very sexy French toffs Marquise Isabelle de Merteuil and Vicomte Sébastien de Valmont, ex-lovers whose relationship has degenerated into callous game playing.  Manville is of course an absurdly good actor, one of the all time greats, and Turner is not bloody bad either. In the sexy, sinister, mirror-filled world conjured by Rosanna Vize’s set and Tom Jackson Greaves’ whirling choreography – filled with silent, glowering courtiers who dance with menacing elegance – the two leads are the main attraction and rightly so. The play has issues but by god do they work it, and not necessarily in the ways you’d expect. Manville’s Merteuil is sexy but not overtly sensuous. Rather, she is cerebral, an expert...

This review is from Inter Alia’s National Theatre premiere in July 2025. In March 2026 it will transfer to the West End, with Pike again leading the cast. Playwrights usually want to flex their range after their first big hit. But it’s to the credit of Suzie Miller that she cares so much about the issues explored in her smash Prima Facie that she’s come up with a follow up that you have to at least describe as ‘a companion piece’.  Both Prima Facie and Inter Alia are named after legal terms, both are about high-achieving female members of the legal profession, and while Prima Facie was a monologue and Inter Alia is a three-hander, both have a huge-scale female role at their centre that makes them the perfect vehicle for a screen star looking to scratch the stage itch. And so both have had Justin Martin-directed UK premieres starring major celebrities: Jodie Comer made her stage debut in Prima Facie, while Rosamund Pike treads the boards for the first time in years in Inter Alia. The most crucial similarity, however, is not entirely apparent from the first half hour or so of Inter Alia, which is basically an extended sequence of Pike’s high court judge Jessica frenziedly girlbossing as she juggles her extremely high-powered job with a busy social life and being a mum to vulnerable teen Harry (Jasper Talbot). It’s a breathless performance from Pike, who crests and surges from neuroticism to icy confidence. It’s draining: there’s barely room for us or her to breathe, and a...

Maxim Gorky’s Summerfolk is the sort of esoteric classic that only gets staged very occasionally: I think this NT revival is the third UK production ever, and the first this century. It’s not hard to see either the reason for its reputation or its infrequent staging. Concerning a group of dissolute nouveau-riche Russians spending a frivolous summer arguing among themselves as societal storm clouds gather, it is pretty damn Chekhovian. On the other hand its enormous cast and prodigious uncut running time mean it’s well beyond the means of most theatres to put on: it has only ever been staged here by the NT and RSC.  This new adaptation by Nina and Moses Raine is a full hour shorter than its previous National Theatre outing in 1999. It’s still overwhelming at first: it feels like you’ve been plunged into a sprawling existential soap opera, teeming with characters and plot lines that have been running for years that you’re having to familiarise yourself with on the fly. Gradually, though, Robert Hastie’s revival does take shape thanks to some delicious luxury casting. Foremost is Sophie Rundle as the gorgeous, disaffected Varvara, who rails with mounting fury against… everything basically. The rootless insubstantiality of her peers; the annoying men who insist on adoring her; her awful husband Sergei, very entertainingly played as a gravelly voiced boor by Paul Ready. The pleasures are pretty soapy throughout: essentially three hours of compulsive people watching. The 22...

For the first 15 minutes or so, I thought I had Welcome to Pemfort’s number. Sarah Power’s play presents as a cosily familiar comedy about a clutch of small-town eccentrics pulling together in an effort to stage a fundraising fun day for the titular medieval fort (not a castle!) that forms the chief point of interest in their sleepy town. And Power has crafted a classic trio of oddballs: dotty older lady boss Uma (Debra Gillett), autistic nerd Glenn (Ali Hadji-Heshmati) and hippyish Ria (Lydia Larson), who believes she’s made friends with a deer. The three of them run Pemfort in relative harmony. But it’s the hire of Sean Delaney’s ex-con Kurtis that starts the real story, the quirky villager tropes used as cover to ask some very hard questions about community and forgiveness. Curtis is a good-hearted, sensitive person who has done the work, wants to be better and wholeheartedly regrets the terrible crime he committed as a young man (exactly what it was we only discover around the halfway point). But his arrival is, nonetheless, a seismic event for the small community. Really, Power’s play is a meditation on human nature and the ability to forgive, magnified through the lens of smalltown life, where every addition to the community is scrutinised and dwelt upon. Clearly Kurtis deserves to be given a second chance. But is it realistic to think he’ll get one? Should he have simply lied about his past? These are hard, painful questions that Power asks unsparingly while also,...

This review is from 2022. Nemesis; hubris; redemption; headgear. Those are pretty much the main themes of Jon Klassen’s wonderous trilogy of picture books that kicked off in 2011 with the seminal I Want My Hat Back, in which a dopey bear wanders the forest looking for his missing red party hat, eventually clocking that it has been nicked by a rabbit, which it’s then very strongly implied that the bear goes on to kill and eat. Followed by This Is Not My Hat – in which a small fish soliloquises to the reader about how he’s definitely going to get away with stealing a big fish’s bowler hat – and We Found a Hat – in which two tortoise pals must decide what to do with a sombrero – the three books contain no shared characters or plot, but are linked by Klassen’s gloriously deadpan, almost woodcut-like drawings, sparse dialogue and bracingly morally ambiguous humour. The same qualities have also made the books tricky to adapt: the National did a sort of maximalist fantasia on I Want My Hat Back a few years ago that was a lot of fun but didn’t especially resemble the source material beyond the key plot beats. The basic problem is that a literal stage adaptation of I Want My Hat Back would only be about ten minutes long, and it’s difficult to see how you can convey Klassen’s distinctive visual style with human actors. But that was before there was a trilogy, and – crucially – before the pandemic. This stage version of the three books started life as a lockdown project for designer...

This review is from 2023. SplitLip’s delightful spoof WW2 musical has been heading inexorably for the West End for something like five years now. It’s a fringe theatre comet that’s gathered mass and momentum via seasons at the New Diorama, Southwark Playhouse and Riverside Studios, and has now made impact in Theatreland – wiping out a West End dinosaur to boot, as it displaces ‘The Woman in Black’ after over 30 years at the Fortune Theatre. And it’s really hard to be anything but delighted for the company, which consists of David Cumming, Felix Hagan, Natasha Hodgson and Zoë Robert. All bar Hagan perform in the show, with Claire Marie Hall and Jak Malone rounding out the cast. This is very much their triumph. And though it’s been redirected for the West End by Robert Hastie, ‘Operation Mincemeat’ is at heart the same show it always was. There are no added backing dancers or bombastic reorchestrations. It’s slicker and bigger in its way, but still feels endearingly shambolic where it counts. It’s a very larky account of the World War 2 Operation Mincemeat, a ploy from British intelligence to feed the German army disinformation via a briefcase of false war plans strapped to a corpse that they hoped to pass off as a downed British pilot (yes, there was a recent film with exactly the same name, about exactly the same thing, and yes they do make a joke about this). The story centres on Charles Cholmondeley (Cumming), the socially inept MI5 operative who dreams up the plan, and...

Read our review of Teeth ‘n’ Smiles. It’s been years since a David Hare play went to the West End – so in 2026, naturally, there are two of them. Over at the Theatre Royal Haymarket his latest Grace Pervades will star his regular collaborator Ralph Fiennes. And at the Duke of York’s one of his oldest plays – dating back to 1975 – will star an unexpected newcomer. Rebecca Lucy Taylor - aka sardonic pop star Self Esteem – did do a stint in the West End’s Cabaret a couple of years back, but she's never been in a straight up play (or, for what it's worth, had to face theatre critics before).  You probably wouldn't have put money on her drama debut being in a Hare play. But actually Teeth 'n' Smiles makes perfect sense for her, being a late ’60s-set drama that concerns Maggie Frisbee, an embittered, alcoholic rock star left raging and washed up at the end of the decade. The role was originated by a young Helen Mirren – who based her performance on Janis Joplin – and in that context it’s not hard to see why Taylor might have been intrigued. Plus! There are songs for Maggie to perform, originally written by Nick and Tony Bicât, but with new contributions from Taylor herself.  It’ll be directed by Daniel Raggett, who did such an excellent job with West End hit Accidental Death of an Anarchist a couple of years back. Taylor is joined by a large cast that includes the great Phil Daniels as Sarrafian.

The first major London revival for the stage version of Ken Kesey’s countercultural classic in over 20 years comes this spring, as Clint Dyer directs Aaron Pierre and Giles Terera as two inmates of a hellish psychiatric ward. Published in 1962, Kesey’s darkly comic satire on psychiatry and institutionalisation was quickly adapted into a 1963 play that starred Kirk Douglas as Randall P McMurphy, a rebellious prisoner who makes the mistake of faking insanity, believing he’ll have an easier time of it in a mental hospital (Jack Nicholson famously starred in the 1975 film as Douglas was too old for the role by the time it finally got made). Pierre – best known for his role in Netflix hit Rebel Ridge – will star as McMurphy, with Olivier winner Giles Terera as his fellow inmade Dale Harding. In what is clearly a pointed gesture, Dyer has cast two Black actors as inmates and that he’s said he wants to pick up on the novel’s ‘conversation on colonialism and identity’. In the most prominent non inmate role, Rachael Stirling will play the vile Nurse Ratched.

This hugely enjoyable tech satire-slash-thriller from US playwright Aaron Loeb is so good at bamboozling you as to what it’s going to be about that I almost hesitate to get into the plot. It’s good! Go see it! Isn’t that enough of a review for you? Okay, there isn’t a massive rug-pulling twist in ROI. But there is some fun misdirection in what initially looks set to be a satire on ethical investment funds. Sassy but idealistic May (Millicent Wong) is the protege – or in his words, ‘work daughter’ – of Paul (Lloyd Owen), the seen-it-all boss of ethical investors the Montrose Fund. One day, she stumbles across a unicorn: Willa (Letty Thomas) is a nervy, spectrum-y doctor with zero people skills who wants an insane $30bn investment in her ideas. But what she’s proposing intrigues May: advanced gene therapy that could change the world by eliminating most genetic conditions (eg cancer, Alzheimer’s). Willa contends that big pharma has suppressed such technology because it would tank their profits. May persuades Paul to take the plunge. The whole play is pointing towards ethical venture capitalist May discovering that she’s more capitalist than ethical. But in fact she proves to be a spirited, unbending heroine, winningly played by Wong. Really ROI is about two things: the inevitably of technological change, and how ill-equipped flawed human beings are to be its avatars.  Loeb is clearly interested in tech and what the near future might look like. It’s not po-facedly THIS WILL...

Once again you can expect to see remarkable feats of astrophotography at the Astronomy Photographer of the Year exhibition. It’s a chance to see magical views of both our own night sky and of galaxies far, far away. The winning spacey visions come from dozens of professional and amateur snappers in various categories including ‘Planets, Comets and Asteroids’, ‘Stars and Nebulae’, ‘Galaxies’ and ‘Young Astronomy Photographer of the Year’ for under-16s. Soar down to Greenwich to see the winners from 2025's competition on display. 

There’s a double bill going on at the Hayward Gallery, and the theme is fabrics: whether it’s what we wear or the fabric of life itself. One ticket gains entry to two companion exhibitions – designed to be experienced one after the other, both shows are riffs on a similar theme.   First up is Chinese sculpture artist Yin Xiuzhen’s Heart to Heart, an ode to used clothes by the Chinese sculpture artist. She describes clothing as a ‘second skin’ which collects the essence of every wearer. A garment, then, becomes a tapestry of all the bodies it’s clothed. Memory is embedded into matter. This effect magnifies with the size of her installations.  Xiuzhen’s ‘Portable Cities’ series is a tribute to how every suitcase is a home, especially since many of us live out of our bags on the move. Unfolding over an airport luggage carousel stitched together using black and white clothes, suitcases contain different cities made out of the garments of its citizens. Hovering above is a gigantic aeroplane, similarly fashioned together. Suitcases, trunks, and other storage receptacles reappear throughout the show; to Xiuzhen ‘home is no longer a fixed address but a collection of belongings packed and ready for transport.’ In the next room is ‘Collective Subconscious (Blue)’: a minibus cut in half and elongated into something resembling a caterpillar. Four-hundred pieces of clothing stitched together and stretched over a metal frame make up the body of this vehicle. As you peer in through the...

Pictorialism îs known as the first international art photography movement and this exhibition will take curious minds inside the scene, exploring how it developed around the world between the 1880s and 1960s.

‘Fun’ is a quality which seems to be all too frequently forgotten by curatorial teams. But it certainly takes pride of place at the Saatchi Gallery’s The Long Now, an expansive, nine- room retrospective which aims to both celebrate its past and reiterate its commitment to championing innovation in the present and future. The show is curated by Philippa Adams, who previously served as the gallery’s Senior Director for over 20 years, and is divided into spaces dedicated to key themes which have underpinned its exhibitions over the last four decades. Abstraction, landscapes, AI and technology, and climate change are all given their own rooms. They’re populated with works, old and new, by artists with whom the gallery shares a long-running history, as well as commissions from emerging artists.A reinvention of the wheel, conceptually speaking, it may not be, but it’s a bona fide feast for the eyes. Across two floors, each room has been curated and installed with care to ensure every piece in the room can shine - no space feels overstuffed. Adams has clearly given careful consideration to how the works will complement each other, both in terms of colour and scale, which enhances the viewing experience and makes you want to linger in every room. It’s a rarity that you find yourself at an exhibition where you genuinely don’t know where to look. However, starting from the very first room, dedicated to mark making and boasting Rannva Kunoy’s marvellous, luminescent,...

It’s hard to know if Italian Renaissance master Andrea Mantegna was issuing a doom-laden warning or just a doe-eyed love letter to history. Because written into the nine sprawling canvases of his ‘Triumphs of Caesar’ (six of which are on show here while their gallery in Hampton Court Palace is being renovated) is all the glory and power of Ancient Rome, but its eventual collapse too. It starts, like any good procession, with a load of geezers with trumpets, parping to herald the arrival of victorious Caesar. As they blare, a Black soldier in gorgeous, gilded armour looks back, leading you to the next panel where statues of gods are paraded on carts. Then come the spoils of war, with mounds of seized weapons and armour piled high, then come vases and sacrificial animals, riders on elephant-back, men struggling to carry the loot that symbolises their victory. The final panel, Caesar himself bringing up the rear, remains in Hampton Court, so there is no conclusion here, just a steady, unstoppable stream of glory and rejoicing.  The paintings are faded and damaged, and have been so badly lit that you can only see them properly from a distance and at an angle. But still, they remain breathtaking in their sweeping, chaotic beauty.  Partly, this massive work is a celebration of the glories of the classical world and its brilliance, seen from the other side of some very dark ages. But along with its rise, you can’t help but also think of Rome's demise, of what would eventually...

‘Nigerian Modernism’ celebrates the achievements of Nigerian artists working on either side of a decade of independence from British colonial rule in 1960. As well as traversing networks in the country’s locales of Zaria, Ibadan, Lagos and Enugu, it also looks further afield to London, Munich and Paris, exploring how artistic collectives fused Nigerian, African and European techniques and traditions in their multidimensional works.

Known for her plaster cast sculptures, ranging from the small (hot water bottles) to the huge (entire houses), a different kind of Rachel Whiteread artwork will be on show in London this February. Rachel Whiteread: on paper will display a selection of drawings by the Turner-prize winning artist, alongside some related sculptures. This is quite the rare occasion, because for decades the artist has forbidden her work in the two different mediums to be displayed together. Many of the drawings date back to the ’90s and have not been publicly shown before. 

‘Exuberance’ is the word of the day at the opening of The Picture Comes First, Rose Wylie’s marvellous retrospective at the Royal Academy. It is referenced in the press materials, and emphasised repeatedly by the show’s curator and the gallery staff on hand to answer questions. After a stroll through the galleries, it is not hard to see why. Though hugely varied in their subject matter – ranging from the Blitz to Nicole Kidman – Wylie’s paintings are unified by a joyful and vibrant energy which beams out from all of them. The RA’s high ceilings and grand interiors act as a brilliant canvas for the artist’s large-scale, often child-like works. The 91-year-old Wylie is the first female painter to have a full retrospective in the space, a fact the institution has shouted proudly about, though on many levels it seems rather shameful given its 250+ year residency in Burlington House. Nevertheless, it only adds to Wylie’s credentials as a trailblazing feminist artist.  Wylie’s paintings are unified by a joyful and vibrant energy The worlds of fashion, entertainment and celebrity are frequent sources of inspiration for the painter. In Lilith and Gucci Boy, she depicts Lilith, the supposed first wife of Adam (of Garden of Eden fame), who left him as she refused to be subservient. In a standout piece, she paints the character adjacent to an attendee of a Gucci fashion show, and labels her ‘the first feminist’. A series of four paintings that depict Nicole Kidman posing on a red...

There’s an undeniable bliss that comes from being next to a large body of water, and this cold London winter has left me craving a day trip to the seaside. However, my desire for escape was sated by visiting Seurat and the Sea at the Courtauld Gallery, where I wandered through quiet coastal towns and had the shore all to myself.  French painter Georges Seurat was dead by 31, but in fewer than 50 canvases he left an indelible mark on art history. By applying thousands of dots and dashes of pure colour right next to each other, he pioneered the technique of Pointillism, which in turn birthed Neo-Impressionism. The aim of this psychedelic morse-code was that the eye, rather than the brush, would blend colours together to create the image.  Though renowned for his scenes of leisuring Parisians such as Bathers at Asnières and A Sunday on La Grande Jatte, more than half of Seurat’s output (and the subject of this show) is stoic visions of the sea from towns along the northern French coast. Seeing as I’ve always found Seurat’s rendering of people somewhat flat and uninspiring, thankfully, these paintings are devoid of people – the only human presence being the boats punctuating the horizon. This heightens the sense of serenity as you trace the geometric silhouettes of ports and harbours mingling with the carefree contours of the surrounding coast. Pointillism really lends itself to seascapes, the unblended paint shimmering under the gallery spotlights like sunlight over the...

Celebrating the centenary of one of Picasso’s most iconic artworks, The Three Dancers, this exhibition explores the Spanish artist’s fascination with performers – including dancers, bullfighters, musicians, acrobats and other entertainers – via more than 45 works ranging from paintings and sculpture to textile and works on paper, some of which are being exhibited in the UK for the first time. They’ll be exhibited in an appropriately theatrical environment too, courtesy of courtesy of contemporary artist and filmmaker Wu Tsang and author and curator Enrique Fuenteblanca, who will transform the Tate Modern’s exhibition rooms into a theatre space that will host a variety of dance and performance pieces throughout the exhibition, including an excerpt from Carmen presented by interdisciplinary arts collective Moved by the Motion, and a site-specific work by flamenco artist Yinka Esi Graves.  Picasso exhibitions might be ten a penny in London these days, but this one sounds like it might stand out.