Exhibition of the week
Hervé Télémaque
This radical Parisian pop artist mixes Tintin and Roy Lichtenstein to tell global stories of modern life.
• Serpentine, London, from 7 October to 30 January.
Also showing
Shilpa Gupta
The Mumbai-based artist presents a meditation on literature and freedom with the words of imprisoned writers from many places and times.
• Barbican Curve, London, from 7 October to 6 February.
Mark Rothko
Late works on paper by one of the most sublime artists of the modern age.
• Pace London, from 7 October to 13 November.
Rossetti
A chance to wallow in pre-Raphaelite romance with Rossetti’s glamorous portraits.
• Holburne Museum, Bath, until 9 January.
Pablo Bronstein
This artist fascinated by 18th-century styles finds a natural home in the magical Soane collection.
• Sir John Soane’s Museum, London, from 6 October to 2 January.
Image of the week
For acclaimed photographer Rankin and the conceptual artists Scott Kelly and Ben Polkinghorne, male baldness is something to celebrate. Baldpieces, a series of portraits of men adorned with striking headwear they call “crowns to adorn balding crowns” focuses on masculine beauty and challenges an enduring taboo. Read more.
What we learned
Theaster Gates’s show of ceramics revealed humanity’s feet of clay
Gus Van Sant is directing an Andy Warhol musical
… while a Frida Kahlo documentary is in cinemas now
Danish artist Jens Haaning delivered empty frames to a gallery in a dispute about low pay
Lubaina Himid warned UK politicians not to meddle with museum boards
Scientists believe they have spotted a fake Rubens
This year’s collectivist Turner prize shortlist poses questions about the nature of creativity
The Street Photographers Foundation find eyecatching ideas in the everyday
In Virginia, debate advances about how to replace Confederate monuments
The Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam is displaying the earliest European portraits of African men
Dina Alfasi found her smart shot on a train
Before photography, America went nuts for painting fruit
Black US artists are making a fashion statement
… while Madinah Farhannah Thompson is tackling rural racism in the UK
… and a portrait artist wants Ugandans to be proud of their skin
Thilde Jensen documented America’s homeless people
Tate faces difficult questions about its Francis Bacon archive
Hokusai did a lot more than wave
Pascal Anson wears one colour at a time
Australia’s blockbuster Songlines exhibition is coming to the UK
… while an archive photograph captured a very different attitude to the Australian landscape
The Nature Conservancy global photo contest winners were announced
… we picked out Australia’s contributors for a second gallery
… and got an expert lesson in capturing the majesty of birds
Susan Ogilvy, meanwhile, captures the intricacy of bird’s nests
A forgotten men’s feminist movement was all for equal play
Ian Cook took Leonard Cohen to the doctor
The writer Michèle Roberts revealed how she rediscovered painting
Marina Abramović considers life deeply as she approaches 75
A new book explores how designers down the years have approached quarantine
Josiah Wedgwood’s pottery sparked a British revolution
A derelict garage made a neat plot for an architect’s home
Designer Isamo Noguchi’s Barbican retrospective feels like a light show
Jennifer Blau explored her mother’s dementia through art
The Inside Out festival offered various responses to climate crisis
There’s an art to starting university
Masterpiece of the week
Peter Paul Rubens: The Union of Earth and Water, circa 1620
Sensuality and science merge in this baroque vision of the elements. Earth and water take human form and are having a love affair, while a satyr, putto and triton gather round them like merry courtiers. Rubens gets his mythology from Ovid’s Metamorphoses, the ancient Latin poem that has arguably had more influence on art than any other literary work. But what makes this little painting so lovely is the way his flowing, fresh brushwork and earthy yet ethereal colours convey Ovid’s sense of the natural world as uncertain and ever-changing.
• Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge
Don’t forget
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