FT Arts

As Sotheby’s prepares for a selling exhibition of the street artist’s work the FT’s arts writer reflects on shock culture – and the art market’s appetite for it.

A developing theme in new music sees artists navigating the fine line between criticism and complicity - and revelling in the contradictions.

Though shortlisted for the prestigious photography award, Nigeria’s Abraham Oghobase has been refused a visa by the UK government. That’s a sorry state of affairs for a country that professes to be in the vanguard of cultural openness, says the FT’s arts writer. This week’s column is read by Alexander Gilmour.

In a despatch from Hong Kong, the FT’s arts writer reflects on the city’s ‘Tate bricks’ moment, and what it tells us about the fast-changing status of contemporary art in China

As St Paul’s Cathedral prepares to unveil a Bill Viola installation, the FT’s arts writer considers the potentially enriching relationship between sacred settings and contemporary art

A brush with institutional hauteur in Nice makes the FT’s arts writer long for the determinedly inclusive museums and galleries of the UK

In the 1980s and 1990s cinema audiences were in thrall to powerful women in erotic thrillers such as Body Heat and Basic Instinct. But whatever became of the genre and is it ripe for a comeback?

The director of Cultural Institute at King's College London reflects on the growing appetite among artists and arts organisations for evidence about the impact and value of what they do

The BBC’s self-parodying show goes too far – in the direction of complacency, complicity and all-round smugness. But comedy can be a remarkable force for exposing the flaws of the society from which it springs

Driven by ubiquitous video technology, a new wave of films – such as the award-winning ‘Gaza: Chronicles of a Conflict’ – favours rawness and immediacy over explanation and context

Art and Mammon are uneasy bedfellows: witness the recent furore over the Sydney Biennale. The solution, says the FT’s arts writer, is for institutions to embrace debates over their funding, not run from them

Tate Britain’s new show explores our fascination with ruins. But where yesterday’s aficionados looked to the remains of ancient civilisations, today’s ruinous visions are of the future

A militarist matchbox, a spoof banknote, a Lennon album. . . the FT’s arts writer presents a very personal history of the past half-century in 10 objects

Matthew McConaughey’s career revival provides a neat case study of how an actor can wrest back control of his image. It also tells a broader story about our weakness for a certain kind of Acting.

Forget Sartre. The Royal Opera’s new ‘Don Giovanni’ suggests that, in a hyper-connected world, hell is the absence of other people