Cathy's Art Diary

Thin exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery exploring the results of a partnership project with six universities from across England and Wales exploring contemporary portrait photography. The gallery offers a series of talks, workshops and tours to which the students respond producing works reacting to the previous year's Taylor Wessing Photo Portrait Prize. I say it is a thin show as there are only a few works shown with minimal explanation. The majority of the work was shown in rolling av display which was quite long to watch in a space with no seating. This intriguing show deserves a better presentation. Closes 18 September 2026

Thoughtful exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery looking at Marilyn Monroe. The show concentrated on how Marilyn and others used images of her and gave her more agency than you usually see her credited for. At the core it looked at the photographers she worked with, their relationships and how the images were used. I loved the way the displays didn't just pick the one famous image from a shoot but a number to show why the one that was used was chosen plus to build more of a story of the event. I also liked the way they often showed an original photograph with the magazine cover it was used for. In response to this it also looked at how artists have represented her both in her lifetime and since. Of course, there were Andy Warhol's but it was good to see a number of Pauline Boty works as well as others by British Pop Artists. The show outlined her life story via the images and included a few artefacts such as a dress from "The Prince and the Showgirl" and ...

Fabulous exhibition at the King’s Gallery of the late Queen’s clothes. It started with her childhood clothes and war time ones culminating in her wedding dress. The small middle section looked at her everyday clothes with tweed skirts, riding boots etc and a selection of scarves. I was very touched by a pair of Fair Isle gloves. The big room was formal wear when she travelled   and was mainly beautiful evening dresses. There was fantastic embroidery and lots of detail representing the countries she visited. Next were ceremonial clothes including the Coronation dress.  The final room was formal daywear arranged in rainbow colours. Throughout you kept recognising outfits you remembered. We said we couldn’t think of any famous outfit which wasn’t there.  Closes 18 April 2027 Reviews Times Telegraph

Lively online discussion from the Wallace Collection exploring how Churchill engaged with modern art. Barry Phipps from the University of Cambridge was in conversation with co-curator of the Wallace Collection on Churchill, Lucy Davis. I got the impression that Davis had expected to just be the chair but Phipps was also asking her questions about how she picked works for the show and how she organised them. The discussion felt a bit random but covered the contemporary artists that Churchill worked with, his writings and speeches on modern art and his relationship in later life with the Royal Academy. They also talked about how his art became more well-known after the Second World War and toured America.

Interesting exhibition at Hauser and Wirth of new work by Roni Horn. The bulk of the work was a large number of drawings of the phrase "I am paralysed with hope" written over and over again drawn over with crayon which gives the words the impression of melting. As I went on a very hot day these seemed very appropriate as I enjoyed their air-conditioning. They were shown with one of her one of her glass sculptures whose top resembles a pool of water to such an extent I had to feel it to be sure. Closes 1 August 2026

Strange exhibition at Hauser and Wirth looking at the career of 20th century artist Francis Picabia. I say strange because this gallery usually shows new contemporary work but this was organised with the Comite Picabia and covered his whole oeuvre. Having just seen lots of stunning art from this period at Sotheby's I'm afraid a lot of this felt like a pastiche as he experimented with contemporary styles including Dadaism, Surrealism and Cubism. It seemed to be guided tour of isms. Closed 1 August 2026