‘It is in evoking the 19th-century interest in death, madness and altered psychic states that “The Empire of Sleep” is most effective’ Juliet Jacques on a show of sleeping beauties at the Musée Marmottan Monet in Paris

The twists and turns in the career of the Nigerian sculptor and painter Ben Enwonwu follow those of his native country as it left British colonialism behind, writes Samuel Reilly

The Irish artist Sarah Dwyer surveys Philip Guston’s drawings in her west London studio, which looks on to a rugby pitch and just might be haunted by the ghost of Charlie Chaplin

‘While his art can’t be completely dissociated from questions of race or art historical reference, what that reading misses is the sheer oddness of Marshall’s vision, and the inventive visual gambits he deploys.’ Digby Warde-Aldam on Kerry James Marshall at the Royal Academy

‘If there is still a sense, as a female diner, of having breached the defences of this Italianate palazzo in the West End, the greater pleasure is in taking in the spectacle on the walls.’ Sophie Barling gazes at the walls of the Garrick Club in London

‘In Counter-Reformation Rome, strangeness was a quality that was cultivated.’ William Aslet explores what drove the taste for distorted shapes in baroque art and architecture

Until now George Lucas’s museum of ‘narrative art’ has had ‘a bumpier ride than an X-wing starfighter pilot trying to fly into the Death Star exhaust port’, but 2026 should be the year it finally opens, writes Michael Delgado

The rise of the term ‘pitch curator’ to replace ‘groundsman’ shows that the influence of the art world is greater than even Rakewell suspected

An exhibition of artists’ depictions of sleep at the Musée Marmottan Monet in Paris is very far from a snoozefest, writes Juliet Jacques

As the prospect of restored state support becomes ever more distant, Britain’s museums are turning to US-fundraising techniques. Can this benefit more than just a handful of large, London-based institutions?

Ben Whishaw plays Peter Hujar and Derek Jacobi takes on Lucian Freud in upcoming films, but if you’re looking for more first-hand accounts, look no further than a documentary about Lois Dodd and William Greaves’s long-awaited film about a famous party at Duke Ellington’s house

‘Eye-catching vessels were traded throughout Europe and eastwards [and have] ‘been found in tombs in China.’ Emma Crichton-Miller surveys the niche but growing market for Roman glass

‘There is something about art history and archaeology that makes previous ages seem especially immediate. No wonder so many scholars of those disciplines have turned to writing ghost stories – chief among them M.R. James.’ Christina J. Faraday reads his tales with an antiquarian eye

Wayne Thiebaud’s many paintings of cakes, deli counters and pinball machines look immaculate but are in fact odes to imperfection, writes Charles Darwent

‘Marilyn Monroe remains the only blonde in the world, in a sense, being more or less unsurpassable in terms of her iconic status, and yet she has produced many descendants.’ A fascinating study of her British counterparts impresses Philippa Snow

One of history’s most mysterious paintings – the Allegory of Good and Bad Government in the Palazzo Publico in Siena – holds lessons for our own time, writes Imogen Tedbury

A huge extension at LACMA, George Lucas’s museum of ‘narrative art’ and a revamped London Museum are just some of the museum openings to look out for in 2026

Gallerists come off badly in features by Cathy Yan and Hlynur Pálmason, Michaela Coel plays a forger in the new Steven Soderbergh and a decades-in-the-making documentary about the Harlem Renaissance finally sees the light of day – Apollo rounds up the art-world movies to look out for in 2026

‘In Counter-Reformation Rome, strangeness was a quality that was cultivated.’ William Aslet explores what drove the taste for distorted shapes in baroque art and architecture

Emily Kam Kngwarray’s paintings may look abstract at first, but, as curator Kelli Cole explains, they are masterful pieces of storytelling about the traditions and landscape of her Aboriginal community

The Apollo 40 list introduces forty artists, thinkers, businesspeople and patrons who are bringing new ways of doing things to the art world. Find out who we’re watching in 2026 here

While exiled in Rome, Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun – Marie Antoinette’s favourite artist – struck up a close friendship with her own idol, Angelica Kauffman. Her art was forever changed as a result, writes Lucy Davies

From iridescent goblets and flasks to fragments of cameo-etched vessels, the appeal of Roman glass is clear, writes Emma Crichton-Miller

‘The left-wing art of the 1930s is often mischaracterised as being full of false certainties and dogmatic commitment.’ A new book about the Artists’ International Association dispels some of these convenient myths, writes Matthew Taunton

At a time when visual literacy couldn’t be more important, art history is in danger of becoming extinct in schools. Helen Barrett makes the case for a subject that is too often seen as the preserve of the privileged

‘Loos was a brilliant architect, a withering critic, a fine writer and, unfortunately, a paedophile. […] For us it taints everything he did, of course, but his work has arguably lasted better than that of any other proto-modern architect.’ Edwin Heathcote on the Vienna interiors of Adolf Loos

‘We take these works somewhat for granted now, but tondi were uniquely Florentine and uniquely challenging: it’s not easy to squeeze four or five people into a circle’ – Alexander Noelle on the genius of the Renaissance painter Filippino Lippi

An exhibition of work by the Danish painter Anna Ancher at the Dulwich Picture Gallery reveals her mastery of atmosphere and offers a glimpse into life in her rural community, writes Lucy Waterson

Until now George Lucas’s museum of ‘narrative art’ has had ‘a bumpier ride than an X-wing starfighter pilot trying to fly into the Death Star exhaust port’, but 2026 should be the year it finally opens, writes Michael Delgado

Cathy Yan’s upcoming film ‘The Gallerist’ was ‘partly shot in Paris: does this mean we can expect a satirical take on Art Basel’s Paris edition? Will the leaky ceilings of the Grand Palais make a cameo?’ Arjun Sajip rounds up the films art-lovers should look out for next year

‘The house on Doughty Street was only one of Dickens’s many residences, and the sheer number of these is entirely in keeping with his lifelong dread of emotional and material insecurity’ – Rod Mengham on the Charles Dickens Museum in London at 100

Alt text in museums doesn’t benefit only low-vision users – it helps all of us think more deeply about how to look at a work of art, writes Emma Cieslik

‘His tidy scenarios can feel naive, or alien, to contemporary audiences. But that’s if you’re not really looking. Carpaccio, like Bruegel the Elder, is nothing if not generous to the wandering eye,’ writes Ben Street

‘Eye-catching vessels were traded throughout Europe and eastwards [and have ‘been found in tombs in China.’ Emma Crichton-Miller surveys the niche but growing market for Roman glass

The Apollo 40 list introduces forty artists, thinkers, businesspeople and patrons who are bringing new ways of doing things to the art world. Find out who we’re watching in 2026 here

Andy Friend’s book about politically committed art in the 1930s ‘reopens pressing discussions about the functions of art in a time of political crisis, to which Cold War pieties provided a neat but unsatisfactory conclusion’, writes Matthew Taunton

Pierre Soulages ‘might seem like the kind of character Italo Calvino could have dreamt up – the man who spent his entire life trying to paint the same painting over and over again’. But on closer inspection, he is an artist of infinite variety, writes Rod Mengham

In a world saturated with images, learning to think about what we see is vitally important. ‘Letting art history become endangered and drift further into elite status is not only unfair, it’s also perilous,’ writes Helen Barrett

‘Shops are always the most ephemeral of designs. Yet here they are. You might suggest that some of that is due to Loos’s impeccable taste and talent. Or you might suggest that it is because Vienna is a city in which things manage to endure.’ Edwin Heathcote on the Vienna interiors of Adolf Loos

‘Be it a pale morning glow, the blush of a setting sun or the period of blue light that colours the atmosphere before dark, the light in Ancher’s paintings commands attention.’ Lucy Waterson on the luminous art of Anna Ancher

False colonnades, optical illusions, incomprehensible objects: why were artists, architects and thinkers in 17th-century Rome so drawn to distorted and deceptive shapes? William Aslet reads ‘The Deformation’ by Susanna Berger

LACMA, George Lucas’s museum of ‘narrative art’, V&A East, and a revamped London Museum are just a few of the museum openings to look forward to in 2026

‘In his work Dickens venerated the idea of home,’ writes Rod Mengham, ‘precisely because a settled existence in a place he could call his own eluded him for most of his life’

Cathy Yan’s upcoming film ‘The Gallerist’ was ‘partly shot in Paris: does this mean we can expect a satirical take on Art Basel’s Paris edition? Will the leaky ceilings of the Grand Palais make a cameo?’ Arjun Sajip rounds up the films art-lovers should look out for next year

Enamelled swords played an important ceremonial role in the courts of 19th-century India. Nicole Ioffredi, curator of a new display at the Wallace Collection, talks us through the artistry of one particular example from Lucknow

‘Alt text is, by necessity, often cursory – an issue that is especially pronounced in museums and galleries. How to convey colour, texture and tone in 150 words or less?’ – Emma Cieslik on how the best descriptions can help everyone see art more clearly

‘The trick is to treat his paintings like Venice itself: to rove unhurriedly through his fictive streets and squares, to indulge in the pleasures of getting lost, allowing meanings to emerge by accident.’ Ben Street revisits some of Carpaccio’s most absorbing works at the Gemäldegalerie

The ghost stories of M.R. James were deeply informed by his work at the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge – and the spookiness of antique objects, writes Christina J. Faraday

As the festive season continues, Molly Pepper Steemson reflects on some of the artists who have found serenity in abundance

The subject of this painting by Marie Laurencin was actually a French film star, but the work will always have a strong family connection for Will Wiles