art & design
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Kiki Smith’s Sky: a layer cake of art history, myth, identity and natureThis 2012 work, created on a computerised Jacquard loom, shows how the artist has moved from the physical to the celestial -
UK places temporary export bar on Parmigianino paintingMove is to allow time for UK-based buyer to match £24.5m price tag for work by 16th-century Italian mannerist
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This week’s best UK exhibitionsFrom one of art’s greatest contemporary photographers to the rich cultural history of famous eruptions -
Jan Cieslikiewicz's search for orderPolish photographer Jan Cieslikiewicz went from maths at Harvard to a Wall Street trading job – and then left it behind to embrace uncertainty
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Ignore the art market – there is only one Bruegel that mattersPieter Bruegel the Elder is the only genius in his family – so why is the UK being flooded with the inferior work of his offspring?
news
in pictures
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Black America in the 19th centuryAn archive made public by Cornell University goes beyond the cliches of cotton-pickers to show African Americans embracing life after slavery
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talking points
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Vermeer: the artist who taught the world to see ordinary beautyJohannes Vermeer was so obscure he wasn’t even remembered when he died, let alone forgotten. But the French avant-garde rescued him – and showed the world his calm, unpretentious genius
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The shows putting a macabre twist on domestic blissThe booby-trapped bedroom, the mysterious mincing machine, the body under the patio … why the sudden spate of shows taking a creepy view of home life?
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reviews
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60 years of sex, sun and seismic shocksFrom his out-and-proud early work to the double portraits and California pools, this retrospective captures the cool sophistication of the rebel in owl glasses
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Revolution: Russian Art – from utopia to the gulag, via teacupsIt was a new dawn. Tractors caused uproar and muscular workers got to the factory on flying bicycles. Then came the purges
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Science Museum's robotic delights hold a mirror to human societyRobots exhibition at the Science Museum, London, is a striking display of 500 years of automata – and raises pressing questions about the future
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Playtime in the world's most inhospitable placesHow do children play in refugee camps, aboriginal reserves and places ravaged by war? Photographer Mark Neville found out
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A balloon-seller in front of a filthy Indian power plant‘These places were initially located outside the city, to protect the air, but urban areas have expanded so fast they’re back inside’
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The female street photographers of InstagramThe art of street photography was long dominated by men and the ‘male gaze’, but new project Her Side of the Street celebrates women’s role in the practice
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Joel Sternfeld on his sly glimpses of wild AmericaThe 72-year-old photographer talks about his beguilingly sinister take on Americana
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A Gypsy family fleeing execution by the Russian army‘They had escaped, but lost their country. He played a Hungarian song on his violin’
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An Iranian woman with a gun in her hair‘It’s usually printed larger than life – so that when someone stands in front of it, the gun is pointing straight at their stomach’
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The man redesigning Greenwich peninsulaThe flamboyant Spanish architect whose Peninsula Place will be the centrepiece of a new £1bn development has a chequered history that includes swelling budgets, leaking roofs and falling tiles
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Christo on the Wrapped Reichstag‘It took 24 years and we had to negotiate with six different presidents. Then it only stayed up for two weeks’
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The brutal brilliance of architect Paulo Mendes da RochaHe’s been blacklisted and seen his work torn down. But the great Brazilian creator of vast gravity-defying buildings has just entered architecture’s elite
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Life in a skyscraperFrom Chicago to Dubai, Manchester to Melbourne, our cities are climbing above the clouds. What’s it like to live on the 64th floor?
the big picture
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The realist surrealistThis French photographer and filmmaker documented everyday scenes – but invested them with the visual daring of the surrealist movement
you may have missed
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The art of survival in post-revolutionary RussiaAhead of a major exhibition at the Royal Academy, Sarah Crompton visits Moscow and St Petersburg to explore a period of hard struggle and creativity
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Stepping out of the shadows of the Bloomsbury setThe artist, best known for her tangled love life and being Virginia Woolf’s sister, gets her first major solo show
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Jacob Epstein: the immigrant bringing morals to the Oval OfficeThe bust of Churchill that sits across from Donald Trump’s desk is created by an immigrant, who reminds us of both the glory of humanity and the evil of fascism
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Today's robots and the artists who foresaw themRoboThespian and the world’s first automaton newsreader are the stars of the Science Museum’s Robots show. But did Da Vinci and Michelangelo beat them to it?
video
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Standing Rock protesters are warning us to save what we canSaudi Arabian artist Ahmed Mater joins protesters at Standing Rock to celebrate their victory
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The artist’s hidden tribute to a sold-off LondonThe street artist Stik set out to ask the denizens of Old Shoreditch how his new mural should reflect their gentrified neighbourhood
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On what turns a picture into a masterpieceRembrandt’s perfect drawing, Caravaggio’s invention of Hollywood lighting, Monet capturing a moment in time. David Hockney and critic Martin Gayford discuss the craft behind the greatest art
Joan Eardley The forgotten artist who captured Scotland's life and soul