DALE BERNING SAWA
Writer, journalist, art critic
Untitled, 1974

Nashville show looks at how the Impressionists and others depicted food production in 19th century France The Art Newspaper

‘It was so fragile, we weren’t certain it wouldn’t collapse’: the architect who sketched Notre Dame’s ancient insides The Guardian

'Tha surge n splurge': Lauren Halsey's kaleidoscopic spaces Shade Art Review

Just a year after opening, Serge Gainsbourg’s house museum hits financial trouble The Art Newspaper

Turning 21 with a bang: Frieze's revamped tent brings emerging galleries to the fore The Art Newspaper

‘I always want to grapple with an unruly beast’: the ghostly works of Dominique White The Guardian

Grace Jones shakes her bones! Great moments in after-dark photography The Guardian

UK general election: the dawn of a new era for the arts? The Art Newspaper

This will sound incongruous to anyone who’s sat through a Theresa May press conference, but Saied Dai says they played a lot to find the right pose for her portrait. He decided early on that she should stand – “she’s very stylish, statuesque” – and though he’d asked that she bring clothing options, he opted for vintage pieces belonging to his wife to achieve the sculptural silhouette he needed. The Guardian
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Mohamed Bourouissa on France’s identity crisis: ‘We’ve got catching up to do!’ The Guardian
The French Algerian artist uses photography, rap music and the frequencies of trees to shine a light on marginalised communities. Read here

Lucy Raven on Land Art and the Western frontierThe Art Newspaper
New York-based artist's exhibitions opens at Dia Art Foundation's new and improved space in New York. Read here

Sophie Taeuber-Arp survey reveals the dizzying range of work by the Swiss artist The Guardian
The major travelling exhibition opens at the Kunstmuseum Basel before travelling to London's Tate Modern and the Museum of Modern Art in New York. Read here

How Lockdown Allowed London’s Local Neighbourhoods to Shine Elephant Magazine
Artists have long celebrated the quiet joy of the city and its local communities, telling a story of political upheaval, power and transformation. Read here


Pixy Liao's best photograph: eating a papaya off my boyfriend's crotch The Guardian
‘There was this trend of eating sushi from a woman’s naked body. So when I found the perfect papaya, I knew exactly how to shoot it’. Read here

Andreas Gursky on the photograph that changed everything: 'It was pure intuition' The Guardian
It went against all he had been taught. But this image of Salerno harbour was a turning point for the great photographer, paving the way to his epic landscapes. Read here

Watch the throne: why artist Thierry Oussou faked an archaeological dig The Guardian
When archaeology students unearthed a royal throne in Benin they were astonished. But it was actually a replica, planted to make a statement about the colonial looting of African art. Read more here

Hicham Benohoud on the boy with the cardboard feet The Guardian
‘I was bored teaching art in Marrakech, so I started taking photographs of my students instead’. Read here

Yto Barrada's best photograph: the prawn factory where women can't talk The Guardian
‘The women peel prawns all day while a big tube pumps in cold air, making a deafening noise. They get few breaks and a manager walks up and down telling them to get back to work’. Read here
Unfamiliar territory: artists navigate the complexities of the refugee crisis The Guardian
From Shahpour Pouyan’s creative reappraisal of Persian miniatures to Bissane al Charif’s exploration of the memories of Syrian refugees, artists are using their work to highlight the human dimension of the refugee crisis. Read here


Sharjah Biennial 16: sprawling emirate-wide exhibition regains its edge The Art Newspaper

Gerhard Richter once thought film wasn't for him—in Rome, his latest exhibition proves how wrong he was The Art Newspaper

More than air in the air: Portia Zvavahera's prayer-filled world Shade Art Review

A dual social and artistic purpose: London's Whitechapel Gallery to screen films by Jarman Award nominees The Art Newspaper

‘Dalí wanted his mouth to be very realistic’: fabled lip sofa prototype at heart of new Surrealist show in Paris The Art Newspaper

Firelei Báez review – bring on the furry ciguapas: magnetic visions of diaspora The Guardian

Hurrah for the Courbet vandals: defacing the vulva painting is basic feminism The Guardian

Mika Rottenberg: 'Giant things are often triggered by tiny reactions' The Art Newspaper

‘I’m doing what may be my last paintings’: Frank Auerbach on his new self-portraits and turning 92 The Guardian

‘My parents’ trauma is my trauma’ – Veronica Ryan on making first Windrush monument The Guardian

Black images matter: Shade, the powerful podcast unpicking the tumult of 2020 The Guardian

Bourse de Commerce: opening of Pinault's long-awaited Paris museum is—pandemic permitting—finally around the corner The Art Newspaper

Bourse de Commerce: opening of Pinault's long-awaited Paris museum is—pandemic permitting—finally around the corner The Art Newspaper

Can artists change the world? MoMA show explores political art from the early 20th-century The Art Newspaper

'Tech CEOs are like cult leaders' – the artists taking on Facebook and big data The Guardian

Marcel Duchamp’s box of delights opens at Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden The Art Newspaper

‘It’s a response to the school shootings’ An-My Lê on her best summer shot The Guardian

Sacre bleu! France as you've never seen her before: Eric Tabuchi and Nelly Monnier's Atlas des Régions Naturelles The Guardian

Our lost world in watercolours – the paintings that documented Earth The Guardian

Nude descending a staircase on a skateboard: Jan Hakon Erichsen’s viral video art The Guardian

Art Institute of Chicago curator Antawan I Byrd on Pan-Africanism as a fruitful idea—and an aesthetic Untitled 1974/Shade Art Review
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‘It’s about total freedom’: Jeff Wall on his photographs of fallen horse riders, flooded graves and the Invisible Man The Guardian
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Chicago explores 'complex terrain' of Pan-African art The Art Newspaper

‘Everything can just be what it is’: the liberated art of Nairy Baghramian The Guardian

‘My sculptures are alive. They dance around the gallery at night’: the viscerally spiritual art of Bharti Kher The Guardian

Francis Alÿs shows that child’s play is a serious business The Art Newspaper

Review of John Akomfrah's British Council commission at the 2024 Venice Biennale, Shade Art Review.

The sounds of someone cooking. A grandmother saying grace at the table. The hubbub of a city square alive with street musicians and polyglot crowds. Quite what being on the move sounds like—not being where you were; living elsewhere than where you're from—is the subject of a new open call for sound recordings from art project Cities and Memory The Art Newspaper
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Phyllida Barlow was that teacher. That person that if you’d had her in primary school, now, at 46, you’d still think of her as Miss Barlow, but you had her at art school, and so 20, 30, 40 years on into a lifelong battle with artmaking – or writing, or parenting, or just being a decent human – you’re still striving to make something she’d rate. The Guardian
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Tunnel visionary: why was land artist Nancy Holt never given her due? The Guardian
Holt made mesmerising works that filtered stars and vanished in the desert heat. But land art was seen as a male preserve. A new exhibition redresses the balance. Read here

Slowing the news: artists commissioned to document a US election year through the act of drawing The Art Newspaper
The final part of an exhibition, delayed by the unprecedented events of 2020, opens at the Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum. Read here

A happy baby on a train: Dina Alfasi’s best phone picture The Guardian
‘That the young girl in the foreground was a soldier with a gun on her knee is an integral part of that moment’ Read here

We Will Walk, Turner Contemporary The Art Newspaper
America's Deep South heads to the UK’s south coast for remarkable exhibition. Read here

Kissing cowboys: the queer
rodeo stars bucking a macho
American tradition The Guardian
Photographer Luke Gilford could not believe his eyes when he first stumbled across a gay rodeo. He set about capturing the joyous, tender, authentic world he saw there. Read more here

Back in the frame: the extraordinary artists Britain forgot Inside Design
Combing through musty studios and garrets has become a way of life for specialists Liss Llewellyn, whose Hidden Gems exhibition lays bare museum-grade works that have fallen into oblivion – more often than not by women. Read more here

Dissecting a gallery in the new MoMA The Art Newspaper
Among the most striking examples of the museum's more global and inclusive approach is a gallery with the theme War Within, War Without. Read here


Why Tarek Atoui's new collection of musical instruments is striking an unfamiliar chord The Guardian
It’s an instrument - but how do you play it and what does it sound like? The discovery of a stash of obscure instruments has inspired a performance artwork at Tate Modern – Dale Berning Sawa took part. Read here

When did just looking at art lose its appeal? The Art Newspaper
Sleep in Hopper’s motel room or dive into Monet’s pond—museums are increasingly going beyond traditional exhibition formats to attract visitors.
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