Today’s highlights
Art
Enzo Mari’s art was a political act
The new Enzo Mari exhibition at London’s Design Museum offers a rare glimpse at the artist’s intentions
Uncovering the lost Caravaggio
Thanks to a letter about delivery, The Martyrdom of Saint Ursula was finally attributed to its great master
Restoring Rubens
The Judgement of Paris gives up its myriad secrets at the National Gallery
Suzanne Valadon: The eccentric artist who gave her name to an asteroid
Even for all her success and the wealth that came with it, Valadon’s bohemianism remained undiminished
Women in revolt: a shared language of radical abstraction
A new exhibition connects the work of over 50 women from across the world
Angelica Kauffman, the heroine of heroines
Her portraits of women in active roles and her self-belief make her a pioneering figure in art history
Books
Matthew d’Ancona’s Culture: Knife is an absolute must-read
Our editor-at-large’s rundown of the pick of the week’s books, television and cinema
The Trial of Vladimir Putin
Barrister Geoffrey Robertson dramatises what might happen within the walls of a future courtroom
El Boom is back
Two generations ago, the chaos of Latin America inspired a wave of remarkable fiction. Now the patterns are repeating
The lost stories of Glasgow
The last-minute cancellation of the city’s intimate and unpretentious book festival Aye Write is an act of cultural vandalism
Clinical. Cynical. Homicidal.
Nikita Teryoshin’s chilling photos of ‘The back office of war’
Matthew d’Ancona’s Culture: Civil War is quite an accomplishment
Our editor-at-large’s rundown of the pick of the week’s cinema, books and streaming
Music
Power, corruption, lies and Brexit
New Order’s Bernard Sumner has nailed the problem with British politics
Mstislav Rostropovich: The cellist who soundtracked the fall of the Wall
Whatever and wherever he played, his deep feeling for the music made the instrument seem like an extension of him
Beautiful spark of divinity
Beethoven’s fascination with the Enlightenment eventually led him to adapt Schiller’s poem An die Freude (Ode to Joy) into his Ninth Symphony
The world’s coolest record label
ECM has been producing stylish jazz since 1969. But with its founder now 80, where do its solemn, spacious sounds go next?
‘We have to remember she was a young girl’ – Eddie Marsan on the new Amy Winehouse film
The actor – reliably excellent as the singer’s father, Mitch, in Back to Black – on addiction, social media rage and antisemitism
Our fate was to be with you: 50 years of ABBA
In 1974, the group won Eurovision.. and changed Sweden
Film
Multicultural Man: On crying
Is crying such a bad thing? I’ve been doing a lot of it recently, for reasons regular readers will be aware of, and it never ceases to help
Return of Marco Bellocchio, the last maestro
His great contemporaries are gone, but the director is still shaking his fists – and miraculously, his films are getting even better
Bonnie Greer’s Vintage: How Roberto Rossellini gave us the real Rome
Quo Vadis is fun but Rossellini’s neorealism showed us Rome as it was
Matthew d’Ancona’s Culture: Knife is an absolute must-read
Our editor-at-large’s rundown of the pick of the week’s books, television and cinema
The trouble with Harry Lime
The Third Man turns 75
Alida Valli: The actress who turned a walk into a victory parade
The Italian will be forever remembered for a wordless walk in a Viennese cemetery
Theatre
PJ Harvey’s Thames musical is a damp squib
London Tide meanders along without knowing what it wants to say
Why is Shakespeare more controversial than ever
Casting decisions put the Bard at the centre of debate about Britishness
The phenomenon Ian McKellen defies time in Player Kings
An 85-year-old delivers vulnerability beneath the bravado in an astonishing late-career performance
Roland Topor: The polymath who made a career out of the grotesque
A dream provided an epitaph inadvertently appropriate for a man who spent his life producing art and literature that shocked and appalled the unsuspecting
Matthew d’Ancona’s Culture: Long Day’s Journey Into Night is breathtaking
Our editor-at-large’s rundown of the pick of the week’s theatre, television, books and cinema
In Nye, British theatre goes beyond history
This production at the National Theatre gives Nye Bevan the Churchill treatment
Great European Lives
Mstislav Rostropovich: The cellist who soundtracked the fall of the Wall
Whatever and wherever he played, his deep feeling for the music made the instrument seem like an extension of him
Alida Valli: The actress who turned a walk into a victory parade
The Italian will be forever remembered for a wordless walk in a Viennese cemetery
Roland Topor: The polymath who made a career out of the grotesque
A dream provided an epitaph inadvertently appropriate for a man who spent his life producing art and literature that shocked and appalled the unsuspecting
Suzanne Valadon: The eccentric artist who gave her name to an asteroid
Even for all her success and the wealth that came with it, Valadon’s bohemianism remained undiminished
Claude Debussy: The composer who captured the rhythms of the sea
Finesse, sensuality and richness are what Debussy brought to a staid musical world unprepared for such an emphatic upending of form and technique
Willem de Kooning: The unintentional painter
To the Dutchman commercial art was just as fulfilling as something more purely creative – and it came with a wage