The UK government has announced that the National Covid Memorial Wall opposite the Houses of Parliament will be permanently preserved. Here is Catherine Mayer on the wall as ‘an extraordinary piece of public art, a place of remembrance and a political statement’. #fromthearchives

A masterpiece by the baroque artist Laurent de La Hyre and a rare bronze dancer by Degas are among the most interesting works to enter public collections over the past month

In his pulling apart of a key scene from the racist epic, ‘Birth of a Nation’ (1915), Stan Douglas shows us what D.W. Griffiths does not, to reveal ‘the manias and delusions undergirding Jim Crow’. Robert Rubsam visits a survey of the Canadian artist’s work at Bard College

Ever since Beyoncé released ‘Lemonade’ there’s been an uptick in women taking baseball bats to cars – and Kim Kardashian is the latest to get in on the act, writes Rakewell

The Royal Academy’s Kerry James Marshall show confirms that this strangest of contemporary painters has more than earned his place in the art historical canon, writes Digby Warde-Aldam

Agnes Crawford visits the Palazzo Farnese in Rome to admire the frescoes of Annibale Carracci – and you can now see the drawings for its magnificent ceiling at the Louvre

‘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

‘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

The British Council’s art collection has always been a great asset for cultural diplomacy. With works acquired often early in artist’s careers, it has also fostered reputations but, with the organisation in dire financial straits, can it carry on talent-spotting?

‘When Marcel Duchamp created La Boîte-en-valise – a kind of museum in a suitcase made up of travel-ready reproductions of his works – he was really just exploiting modern methods of manufacture to revivify ancient habits.’ David Gelber on the long tradition of art made to be moved

How to get a glimpse behind the mask of ancient Egypt? Seek out the artisans of the royal tombs and other marvels – as Sophie Barling did ahead of ‘Made in Ancient Egypt’, on show at the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge

Emma Crichton-Miller surveys the growing global market for Chinese art made after the death of Mao

‘Prices range from a relatively modest €10,000 to more than €1m, but everyone who visits the gallery can feast freely on this illuminating show’ – Susan Moore is dazzled by a display of Renaissance enamels in Paris

‘In Sally Potter’s Orlando (1992), she became the androgynous star of British art cinema. She has since become the androgynous star of international cinema.’ Now, at an exhibition in Amsterdam, Tilda Swinton seems to be reckoning with her art-house ubiquity, writes Fatema Ahmed

Ever since Beyoncé released ‘Lemonade’ there’s been an uptick in women taking baseball bats to cars – and Kim Kardashian is the latest to get in on the act, writes Rakewell

Was Virginia Woolf imaginatively drawn to water? Did she spend time in the countryside? Did she live in a square? Did the Bloomsbury Group wear clothes? There are books answering all these questions and many more. But perhaps, suggests Matthew Sperling, it’s time to move on (at least for a while)

Sophie Barling tries the fine dining in London’s clubland, but finds herself more drawn to the art on the walls

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

‘The British Council Collection is not widely understood. In recent days I have seen it discussed as if it is merely décor’ – Annebella Pollen on the importance of the cash-strapped organisation’s hardworking art collection

Contemporary galleries are increasingly bringing art into their surroundings via trains, trucks and even bicycles – but moveable artworks have a surprisingly long and storied history, writes David Gelber

A purpose-built artisans’ settlement near the Valley of the Kings offers up tales of broken chisels, fights and hangovers – and with them, writes Sophie Barling, glimpses of humanity behind the marvels they made in ancient Egypt

Sonia Gomes talks to Apollo about her São Paulo studio, where visitors are served cachaça and invited to take in her collection of frog-related souvenirs

Christina Makris has faith in a Bordeaux vineyard first planted by priests, where wine tastings are paired with woodcuts by Dürer

Albert Barnes ‘compared his collecting bug to having rabies’ and said that looking at the Renoirs he owned helped dissolve his ‘damnable’ psychological complexes. Christopher Turner reads a new biography of the irascible founder of the Barnes Foundation in Philadelphia

Work by late 20th-century and contemporary Chinese artists has been throwing up surprises recently, writes Emma Crichton-Miller

In the 16th century the French city of Limoges breathed new life into the medieval art of enamelling – and the results were spectacular, writes Susan Moore

Ever since Beyoncé released ‘Lemonade’ there’s been an uptick in women taking baseball bats to cars – and Kim Kardashian is the latest to get in on the act, writes Rakewell

At the Eye Filmmuseum in Amsterdam, Tilda Swinton has turned herself into a work of art, with a little help from her friends

‘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

The British Council’s art collection has always been a great asset for cultural diplomacy. With works acquired often early in artist’s careers, it has also fostered reputations but, with the organisation in dire financial straits, can it carry on talent-spotting?

A masterpiece by the baroque artist Laurent de La Hyre and a rare bronze dancer by Degas are among the most interesting works to enter public collections over the past month

‘The works impress less as relics of German Renaissance piety and more as meditations on devotion and endurance – themes mirrored in wine, which demands patience to reveal its potential and depth.’ Christina Makris visits a French vineyard that pairs Dürer woodcuts with fine wine

Christopher Turner reads a new biography of Albert Barnes, the American millionaire who ploughed his fortune into bringing modern European art to the masses

As well as devising the layout that makes Yerevan, the capital of Armenia, a masterpiece of modern urbanism, the architect Alexander Tamanyan ‘launched what may be the last great historicist architectural tradition of the 20th century’

‘Prices range from a relatively modest €10,000 to more than €1m, but everyone who visits the gallery can feast freely on this illuminating show’ – Susan Moore is dazzled by a display of Renaissance enamels in Paris

‘Marie Antoinette has always been what we make her’ – Kirsten Tambling on how successive ages have cast the doomed queen in their own image

A magnificent gilded cup by a 16th-century goldsmith fuses organic form with astonishing craftsmanship, says Caterina Badan of the Schroder Collection

A copy of the original painting ‘His Master’s Voice’ – one of the most famous trademarked images of the 20th century – has been acquired by the Huguenot Museum in Rochester. It’s one of Apollo’s top acquisitions of the past month

‘Sargent was working when capitalism was reshaping the norms of life and patterns of movement for everyone, but especially for those at the top’ – Emily Cox on the greatest artist of the Gilded Age

‘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

Emma Crichton-Miller surveys the growing global market for Chinese art made after the death of Mao

Albert Barnes ‘compared his collecting bug to having rabies’ and said that looking at the Renoirs he owned helped dissolve his ‘damnable’ psychological complexes. Christopher Turner reads a new biography of the irascible founder of the Barnes Foundation in Philadelphia

‘The British Council Collection is not widely understood. In recent days I have seen it discussed as if it is merely décor’ – Annebella Pollen on the importance of the cash-strapped organisation’s hardworking art collection

‘Prices range from a relatively modest €10,000 to more than €1m, but everyone who visits the gallery can feast freely on this illuminating show’ – Susan Moore is dazzled by a display of Renaissance enamels in Paris

‘When Marcel Duchamp created La Boîte-en-valise – a kind of museum in a suitcase made up of travel-ready reproductions of his works – he was really just exploiting modern methods of manufacture to revivify ancient habits.’ David Gelber on the long tradition of art made to be moved

‘What was life at home like in the Dutch Republic of the 17th century, when that tiny nation was one of the most powerful on earth?’ Lucy Davies wanders through the rooms of an exhibition at the Rijksmuseum that brilliantly conveys a sense of the past

‘In Sally Potter’s Orlando (1992), she became the androgynous star of British art cinema. She has since become the androgynous star of international cinema.’ Now, at an exhibition in Amsterdam, Tilda Swinton seems to be reckoning with her art-house ubiquity, writes Fatema Ahmed

Yerevan, the capital of Armenia, is a masterpiece of 20th-century urbanism and at the core of the city’s identity, writes William Dunbar, is the modernist masterplan laid out by the architect Alexander Tamanyan a hundred years ago.

A purpose-built artisans’ settlement near the Valley of the Kings offers up tales of broken chisels, fights and hangovers – and with them, writes Sophie Barling, glimpses of humanity behind the marvels they made in ancient Egypt

‘It could all come dangerously close to gimmickry – or worse, agitprop – were the artist less firmly wedded to keeping things interesting.’ Digby Warde-Aldam on Kerry James Marshall’s modern mastery of history painting