The London Art Discerner

News, opinions and reviews since circa 879 AD


The Life and Work of Élodie Marchand (1817–1879)

From the Handbook of Lesser-known Artists. In the grand pantheon of 19th-century European art, names...

Film Review: The Chrysanthemum Variations

★★★★½ (4.5/5) With The Chrysanthemum Variations, director Aurelio Draegert has created a work so audacious...

Weston-super-Mare: Melancholy Theatre of the Seaside

Weston-super-Mare occupies a curious place in the English imagination. At first glance, it is the...

Faces of Now: Jordan Ellery and the Pop Digital Vanguard

On the 422nd floor of a glass tower in Hong Kong’s Central district, the elevator...

Shakespeare’s Debt to Caravaggio: A Meditation on Theatrical Light and Human Darkness

The notion that Shakespeare, the playwright of Stratford, might owe a debt to Caravaggio, the...

The Negative Frame: Shadows, Margins, and the Hidden Logic of Renaissance Composition

Art history has long been governed by what it chooses to see. From Vasari onward...

Film Review: Ashes of Meridian

★★☆☆☆ (2/5) There is no question that Mara Luyten’s Ashes of Meridian aspires to the...

Jane Bastion: I Love Art, So Why Do I Find Hand-Painted Cars Revolting?

I love art of almost all kinds, but there is one type that continually leaves...

Brighton: Culture on the Sea

Few English cities wear their cultural identity quite so conspicuously as Brighton. To step from...