Features
Will replicas tempt museums to return looted objects more quickly?
The Chrysler Museum of Art has given a looted monolith back to Nigeria and received a facsimile in exchange. Will other institutions follow suit?
What does the National Portrait Gallery say about Britain today?
The museum has reopened with a new entrance and a complete rehang of the collection – but there’s no getting away from its founding purpose
Is Istanbul Modern living in the past?
The newly reopened museum has an impressive collection of Turkish art, but seems strangely disconnected from the present
The seaside gallery that aims to be more than a tourist destination
East Quay is an arts centre breathing new life into the Somerset town of Watchet and it has a real sense of social purpose
The ballet that woke up post-war Britain
Oliver Messel’s rococo sets for ‘The Sleeping Beauty’ at the Royal Opera House represented a new dawn for dance
Buffalo’s oldest museum enters a new era
The Buffalo AKG Art Museum, formerly the Albright-Knox, reopens with a strong sense of civic purpose and a firm commitment to modern art
Fine dining with Patrick Caulfield
The painter’s atmospheric restaurant interiors and precise still lifes put him at the top table
Acquisitions of the Month: May 2023
The most expensive manuscript to ever be sold at auction and an impressive collection of Dutch Mannerist prints are among this month’s highlights
‘Every prince in Europe would have coveted a goblet like this’
This richly coloured glass is a window to a key moment in the history of science and of princely patronage, says the Rijksmuseum’s curator Maartje Brattinga
When Marilyn Monroe met Richard Avedon
A publicity shoot for ‘The Prince and the Showgirl’ caught the photographer and his subject at an unusually vulnerable moment
Ripe histories – winemaking in Lebanon
The country has been producing wines for centuries, but they are only now getting the global recognition they deserve
Show trial – James Ensor’s macabre courtroom drama
The novelist Louise Welsh is spooked by the Belgian artist’s menacing ‘Great Judge’
How to rebuild a Central European city
The reconstruction of cities devastated by the Second World War took radically different forms, depending on the circumstances
From Bruce Lee to Blobbyland – a guide to London Gallery Weekend
With more than 150 exhibitions staged across the capital, Apollo’s editors pick out the ones they don’t want to miss
London’s most gruesome museum is back – and weirder than ever
The Hunterian Museum has reconsidered the ethics of showing human remains without sacrificing its weird charm
A short guide to Carlo Scarpa’s Venice
Christina Makris goes in search of the work of the architect renowned for marrying traditional craftsmanship to modernist details
Eriko Inazaki wins the Loewe Foundation Craft Prize
The Japanese ceramicist was awarded the top prize for her ingenious work at a ceremony in New York
Punishment for gluttons: La Grande Bouffe at 50
Marco Ferreri’s ode to eating may be one of the most disgusting films about food ever made
Acquisitions of the Month: April 2023
The joint acquisition of Joshua Reynolds’s ‘Portrait of Mai (Omai)’ by the National Portrait Gallery and the J. Paul Getty Museum has been confirmed
The creative curating of Walter Hopps
The Menil Collection in Houston looks at the groundbreaking work of a curator who brought a new generation of American artists into museums
What Handel liked to hang on his walls
Three hundred years after the composer moved into his London townhouse, what does the art collection he amassed there tell us about his music?
The unnerving appeal of wax figures
From votive offerings to anatomical models, wax is the perfect material for blurring the boundaries between art and life
The modern potter who was devoted to Delft
When Simon Pettet moved into Dennis Severs’ House in Spitalfields he began to channel the 18th century in the 1980s
‘Sydney Modern must be given time to evolve’
The Art Gallery of New South Wales’s extension is too populist and commercially minded for some – but it is full of possibilities
The many faces of Mary Magdalene