Exhibition of the week
Ribera: Art of Violence
A savagely compelling insight into the violent world of 17th-century Naples and the insightful art of Jusepe de Ribera it inspired. Ribera himself was no slouch with a dagger: contemporary biographers accused him of threatening or even murdering rival artists. Yet his art is gorily profound. It is one of the year’s best exhibitions.
• Dulwich Picture Gallery, London, from 26 September to 27 January.
Also showing
Turner Prize
Charlotte Prodger, Forensic Architecture, Naeem Mohaiemen and Luke Willis Thompson compete for one of the most notorious prizes on the planet.
• Tate Britain, London, from 26 September.
Space Shifters
Anish Kapoor, Richard Wilson and other mind-bogglers promise to bend your sense of reality with disorientating installations.
• Hayward Gallery, London, from 26 September to 6 January.
Julie Mehretu
New paintings from this intelligent and expansive artist with a real claim to be Cy Twombly’s living heir.
• White Cube Mason’s Yard, London, from 21 September until 30 November.
Future Knowledge
Tania Kovats, Eline McGeorge, Andy Owen, Lucy Kimbell and others survey the fragile state of planet Earth.
• Modern Art, Oxford, from 22 September to 28 October.
Masterpiece of the week
Saint Sebastian by Guido Reni, 1630-35
It was a life-changing moment for young Oscar Wilde when he saw a version of this painting and responded to its homoerotic portrayal of a naked youth pierced by arrows. He wrote about its effect on him in one of his first suggestive explorations of sexuality. Guido Reni is an incredible master of light and darkness who uses that command here to paint a sensual icon of pallid suffering. His tortured saint in the permanent collection at Dulwich Picture Gallery makes a great accompaniment to its amazing exhibition of his contemporary Ribera.
• Dulwich Picture Gallery, London
Image of the week
Toshio Shibata, considered one of Japan’s leading landscape photographers, trains his lens on trees for a New York exhibition of Treescapes, featuring shots by Shibata and emerging artist Yoko Ikeda. View a gallery of their photography.
What we learned
Polly Apfelbaum takes us on a trip into a Technicolor dreamscape
Jenny Holzer is ‘scared and disgusted’ about America today
Zina Saro-Wiwa, daughter of Ken Saro-Wiwa, explores African culture from inside and outside
Jusepe di Ribera was the master of gore and a miraculous painter of the male body
… but who is the real villain of his painting Apollo and Marsyas?
How feminist artists of the 70s took on patriarchy
Steve McQueen is going back to school
So is the Frieze London art fair – with a gossiping opera singer
Iranian film-makers take photos, too
There’s conspiracy afoot at the Met Breuer in New York City
The Royal Opera House premiered a new £50.7m look
Colourful clothes designer Mary Katrantzou only wears black
… while Martin Parr professes to know nothing about fashion
Young American footballers say goodbye to the game
New York’s Museum of Broken Windows tackles race issues
… and Deana Lawson focuses on beauty
The New East photography prize has announced its shortlist
Street artists are mobilising for men’s health charity event Movember
Denis Thorpe looked north (and south, east and west)
Larry Fink commanded the boxing ring
London’s new Science Gallery reveals how sex, drugs and social media have us hooked
… While the Science Museum explores the end of the Romanovs
We remember ‘bad-taste’ architect Robert Venturi, who died this week
Stock image supplier Getty has turned its lens on Australia
… and a stunning record of vanishing Native American tribes is going up for auction
Don’t forget
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