Staged in venues from Quad contemporary art gallery to Westfield shopping precinct and titled Format11: Right Here, Right Now: Exposures From The Public Realm, this year's annual festival of lens-based art focuses on street photography, including (above) Vivian Maier's 1954, New York, NY. At various venues, to 3 April
Photograph: Vivian Maier
Manfred Pernice's spiral staircase elevates novel vantage points for the viewer who becomes absorbed into the heart of the structure. Geometric abstraction with a muted sense of humour. At Dundee Contemporary Arts, to 8 May Photograph: PR
Michel Campeau's series, Darkroom, is an elegy to those who conjure images from photosensitive paper in red-lit rooms. Above, his Sans titre 3281 (Paris, France). At Ffotogallery, Turner House, Sat to 9 April
Photograph: Centre National des Arts Plastiques; ministre de la Culture de la Communication, Paris
The late, great Nancy Spero was a leader in protest art, and her defiant vision is now getting the first major survey since her death in 2009. Above, Spero's Artaud Painting: This Crucible of Fire..., 1969. At Serpentine Gallery, W2, to 2 May
Photograph: Galerie de France, Paris
This, Mellors's first big solo show in a UK institution, presents his latest series, Ourhouse. Riffing on Pasolini's Teorama and conceived as episodes in a TV drama, it depicts the antics that ensue when a stranger, The Object, invades a country house and takes control of language. Above, Hippy Dialectics (Ourhouse), 2010. At ICA, SW1, Wed to 15 May
Photograph: GJ van Rooij-de Hallen
Adventurous work, some of it with a political kick, is included here by more than 20 artists. Above, Nicolas Deshayes's Public Work (1), 2009. At 176 Gallery, NW5, plus off-site installations, Thu to 12 June Photograph: PR
Nelson spent over five years travelling through 18 countries and five continents to gather this global picture of humanity's obsession with cosmetic youth and beauty for his series Love Me. Above, Christopher, 22. Chest wax. J. Sister's salon. New York, USA. At Impressions Gallery, to 29 May Photograph: Zed Nelson
With some 80 paintings, watercolours and prints, John Martin: Heaven & Hell is the most comprehensive exhibition in modern times of the artist's early 19th-century apocalyptic melodramas. Above, Martin's The Destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah (1852). At Laing Art Gallery, to 5 June
Photograph: Tyne & Wear Archives & Museums
