Art

“Whatever happened to Gary Cooper?” asks Tony Soprano of his therapist, Dr Melfi, in the first episode of The Sopranos, which aired in 1999. “The strong, silent type. That was America. He wasn’t in touch with his feelings. He just…
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The godfather of the Florentine republic sighed. Perhaps he also stroked a cat, Vito Corleone-style, as he considered yet another request for a favour. This time it was the sculptor Donatello who needed help from his patron, Cosimo de’…
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If you’re active on any social media platform chances are you’ve seen your friends share 3D-animated avatars that seemingly look like their ‘digital twin’ with a QR code inviting their friends and followers to add them on an app called…
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“I’d like to open this evening’s auction at €50mn.” The words spoken by Sotheby’s auctioneer Oliver Barker to commence last May’s high-octane sale in a Stuttgart museum fell on the ears of an invitation-only audience that was evidently…
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A call to spring and nature rising in the heart of the gritty wintry city, Helen Frankenthaler’s “April Mood”, a luscious, watery extravaganza of stain-soaked pink, orange and blues, floats across the opening wall of the Whitechapel…
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Stephen Burgen’s elegy for the Mallorcan town of Deià (What price paradise? How a Mallorcan artists’ haven became ‘a ghost town’, 21 January) is a reminder that in its prime it was one of the most vibrant and vital artistic and creative…
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The urban planner and architect John Thompson, who has died aged 78 after a long illness, was a leading proponent of “community architecture” and the founding chairman of the Academy of Urbanism. He was one of the most prominent advocates…
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A “unique” Tudor jewelled pendant inscribed with the initials of Henry VIII and Katherine of Aragón has been unearthed by a Birmingham café owner who took up metal detecting only six months before making his spectacular find.The gold…
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In a jarring moment, Simon Boccanegra’s flag-draped coffin is carried on to the stage moments before the dying old man has stumbled off it. Droll humour or sloppiness? With Vasily Barkhatov’s new production for Berlin’s Deutsche…
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A wooden pier leans awkwardly over a lake, its spindly legs enveloped in marsh grass. Across the water, Copenhagen juts towards an amber sky, more a spasm of sooty brushstrokes than a sharply defined skyline. On the milky expanse between…
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