Doig the DJ, Tate’s Sami-Norwegian Turbine and Ruscha’s eerie jokes – the week in art

5 days ago 14

Exhibition of the week

Máret Ánne Sara
Expect an earthy, and earth-conscious, installation on a grand immersive scale from the latest commission in the Tate Turbine Hall.
Tate Modern, London, 14 October-6 April

Also showing

Peter Doig: House of Music
Ecstatic, dream hang of Doig’s paintings plus his vinyl record collection playing through colossal speakers salvaged from cinemas. As cool as art gets.
Serpentine Gallery, London, to 8 February

Ed Ruscha: Says I, to Myself, Says I
The latest brilliant and eerie jokes by a great American artist who is both conceptual provocateur and pop painter.
Gagosian Davies Street, London, 14 October-19 December

Frieze London/Frieze Masters
It’s that time of year again and the squirrels run for cover as the super rich go shopping in the park.
Regent’s Park, London, 15-19 October

Julian Bell: England Road
Meditative landscapes and city scenes by a painter on a road trip through England.
Natasha O’Kane Gallery, London, 14-19 October

Image of the week

St Bartholomew’s hospital new wingWendy Porter, a nurse at the hospital, stands in the Grand Staircase, which is decorated with large-scale history paintings by William Hogarth, The Good Samaritan (left) and The Pool of Bethesda (1735-1737

They had remained almost unseen for 300 years, but now two of William Hogarth’s masterpieces are on show to the public for the first time. Wendy Porter, a nurse at the hospital, is seen here standing in the staircase of the North Wing at St Bartholomew’s hospital in London, which contains The Pool of Bethesda and The Good Samaritan – two large-scale murals by the British painter. It opened to all on Monday after a £9.5m restoration project. Read the full story

What we learned

Country days in Somerset saved Don McCullin’s sanity

Happiness is a warm silicone gun for Lisa Herfeldt

Independence for Nigeria freed the minds of its artists

Weekends for art dealer Betty Parsons were strictly for painting her own work

The British Museum’s Nordic Noir show is scarily poor

Wayne Thiebaud’s still lifes of sweets and cakes are a taste of the American dream

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Don Bachardy recalled how Hockney painted him for a landmark work of queer art

Masterpiece of the week

Flood Waters by Claude Monet, 1896

Painting titled ‘Flood Waters’ by Claude Monet (1840-1926) French impressionist painter.

Here comes the flood, as the great impressionist records an unexpectedly apocalyptic scene. Floods in art are usually biblical. Artists including Uccello, Michelangelo and Poussin painted the deluge as a divine punishment by God, leaving sinners drowning or scrambling for tiny rocks while Noah survives in the Ark. But there is no such sacred meaning here. Monet is simply observing a bit of bad weather. Stranded at his home in Giverny by local flooding in autumn 1896, he used the time to paint this gloomily entrancing view of a water-covered field. Barren trees rise like spectres from the grey swamp as the drowned earth merges with mists above. This is a starker, grimmer version of Monet’s waterlily paintings: as in those dreamy decorations, he melts and mirrors one reality into another, sky reflecting water, but here the effect is haunted, even nightmarish.
National Gallery, London

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