“Astonishing and gripping: Van Gogh’s Self Portraits at the Courtauld reviewed”
Martin Gayford, The Spectator
In the latest Spectator, Martin Gayford reviews the first-ever exhibition of Van Gogh’s self-portraits, now on view at the newly reopened Courtauld Gallery in London. Van Gogh created thirty-five known paintings and drawings of himself between 1886 and the fall of 1889, fifteen of which are in the new exhibition, including the Courtauld-owned Self-Portrait with Bandaged Ear (1889) completed a few weeks after the infamous incident. According to Gayford, there are several reasons why Van Gogh painted himself so many times. First, the cost of models was often prohibitive, and second, Van Gogh’s “disquieting manner” deterred potential sitters. The curators propose a third reason: Van Gogh found himself an especially interesting subject. The artist was highly changeable, not only emotionally, but also physically—he would shave and regrow his beard, for instance, or take out his false teeth and put them back in—and could therefore paint remarkably varied self-portraits.
“Ancient sculpture is ‘most important prehistoric art find in UK for century’ ”
Tobi Thomas, The Guardian
Archeologists have announced the discovery of a five-thousand-year-old chalk sculpture with designs similar to those on other objects from the time of Stonehenge. Dubbed the “Burton Agnes drum” by the archeologists who excavated it in east Yorkshire, where it was buried alongside the bodies of three children, the object bears a striking resemblance to the British Museum’s “Folkton drums,” which were discovered in the nineteenth century and also found near buried children. The museum will display all of these drum-shaped sculptures alongside over four hundred prehistoric objects in a new exhibition, “The World of Stonehenge,” the first major exhibition in the United Kingdom on the monument. Researchers say the objects were likely intended as “talisman[s] to protect the deceased children they accompanied.”
Podcast:
“Roger Kimball introduces the February issue.” A new podcast from the Editor and Publisher of The New Criterion.
Dispatch:
“Czech it out,” by Jay Nordlinger. On a concert of the New York Philharmonic, conducted by Jakub Hrůša.