From ‘Un-House’ to Geodesic Domes: Architectural Experimentations of 1960s-70s
In 1965 article “A Home is Not a House” for Art in America magazine, Reynar Banham coined the concept of ‘un-house’ – one that radically deviated from the traditional idea of a house by being a mere shell to conceive services such as heating, cooling, and plumbing. Banham noted upon the society’s trend to seek…
The Theological Collapse of Concrete Cathedrals
Egyptian Architect Abdelwahed El-Wakil said ‘We die and our buildings die with us’ in response to the temporal nature of modern buildings. He saw modern architecture as a space of dissonance between the world of nature and the world of the human. But what about the space beyond nature? What about buildings devoted to faith?…
Behind the exhibition: A Conversation with Curator Miriam Kanner
I recently interviewed Miriam Kanner, a writer here at Paper Galleries, and a second-year History of Art student at UCL who recently curated two exhibitions at Arc London. Her first exhibition, Moving in Translation, became the first solo show for the artist Zoya Ilina, presenting landscapes and still lifes from various cities the artist had…
Art and Ruler: The War Over Visual Culture
Art has almost always been a political battleground. It has been harnessed by rulers, suppressed by dictators and controlled by states, all of whom understood it to be a vital source of power. Despite being a mode of expression, artistic production can be easily exploited as a tool for societal repression through both censorship and…
Emily Ponsonby on seeing “Through Butter”
With Valentine’s Day around the corner, we’re encouraged to spend a little more time and put in a little more effort for the ones we love. It reminds me of the work by an artist I recently discovered this past October; on a little pre-Frieze gallery hop, I was drawn into the wonderful Gillian Jason…
Light in the Paintings of John Singer Sargent
John Singer Sargent is widely regarded as one of the most accomplished painters of light in late nineteenth and early twentieth century art. Across his portraits, landscapes, and murals, Sargent uses light not merely to illuminate form but to structure composition, convey atmosphere, and articulate social and psychological meaning. His approach synthesizes academic training, Impressionist…
On Muses, On Venus, On Fantasy
The reproduction of the female form in art history becomes as exploitative as its consumption. The female body must perform the function of Madonna or whore, the lustful or the shameful, the desired or undesirable. We seem to be controlled by a binary, where a woman must become the entire essence of something idyllic, lacking…
Parajanov’s The Colour of Pomegranates: a convergence of language, thread, and history
Watching Sergei Parajanov’s 1969 film The Colour of Pomegranates will make you feel as if you’re wandering through endless rows of a colourful market fair. The patterned rugs alongside antique vases, the rich textiles and archaic manuscripts, the nacreous shells, the candleholders, the flowers — all compete for your gaze with their allure. The same…
An Iconographic Walk through the National Gallery with Roma Liberov’s Reflections
On 16 January, The Arc London in Fitzrovia opened Roma Liberov’s solo exhibition Reflections: “a poem is as real as a utility bill”, which I had the privilege to curate. The show brings together a series of mixed-media photographic works created over the past two years of the artist’s life in London. Liberov’s practice, long…
Rethinking Art in 2026
Historically, the art market has been perceived as a closed sphere: a world concentrated between London and New York, where key positions are taken by blue chip galleries and major auction houses trading highly priced masterpieces. However, in recent years this landscape has begun to shift, driven by rapid technological advancements and an increasingly volatile…
The Missing Touch: Why AI Can Never Create True Art
Generative AI has advanced to the point where it can produce visual outputs from written prompts, creating images that often appear symmetrical, lifelike, and perfectly smooth. Such qualities have sparked debate over whether such works can be considered true art. Take Indian designer and artist Amith Venkataramaiah, who uses the generative AI programme Midjourney to…
Sun-Drenched Stillness: Colour and Memory in Bermudian Art
This winter, I had the pleasure of being back in my home country, and attending two fantastic exhibits put on by Masterworks Bermuda and the Bermuda National Gallery. These showings in Bermuda present a compelling opportunity to reflect on colour, light and place through two thoughtful exhibitions at the island’s major art institutions. At the…
The Art of Nature & The Nature of Art
Not all art is meant to be hung on a wall, and maybe with the over-commercialisation of artworks in the modern world it shouldn’t need to be. Recently I’ve seen a lot of discourse on the apparent soullessness and emptiness of art fairs and exhibitions geared towards buyers not viewers. Suggesting that personal experience and genuine story…
Enduring the Cold: Winter in Sixteenth Century Flemish Genre Scenes
During the cold winter days, we tend to spend time with our loved ones, enjoy the flicker of garlands, and quietly contemplate the year from the warmth of our home. Naturally, everyone has their own traditions and rituals – some private, some shared. Yet, it is especially in the winter that there seems to be…
Paris in The White Cube: Exhibitions Not to Miss Before Le Réveillon
Now, if like me, you have suddenly found yourself on a Eurostar last week, bound for Paris at the tail end of the first term, finishing the last of your coursework, while rushing to embrace friends and family, to mark Catholic Christmas, Hanukkah and other holidays under the bells of Notre-Dame, I assume you have…
Technologies and Bodies: from Umberto Boccioni to Angela Sanatana
Technological progress has always had a profound impact on culture, shaping the ways people live and perceive the world. These shifts have often been reflected in art, as artists respond to changing conditions of everyday experience. In the early twentieth century, Italian Futurists were fascinated by the rapid development of modern technologies, particularly the automobile, which dramatically…
The Ecstasy of Saint Teresa: The Intersection Between Religion and Eroticism
Like the sun catching the peak of a wave, glinting as it ebbs and flows, light falls down upon The Ecstasy of Saint Teresa. Gian Lorenzo Bernini’s Baroque sculptural altarpiece is the centre of a 360 degree commission from the Cornaro family and a humanisation of the tales of the eponymous Teresa of Avila, a…
Why Do We Love Yoshimoto Nara?
If you’ve seen a pair of opalescent eyes staring at you from the back of a laptop, or a phone case, the chances are that it’s one of the bright-eyed girls painted by Yoshimoto Nara. Born in 1959 in post war Japan, Nara has nearly 40 solo exhibitions since 1984, and it seems like he’s…
Giorgio de Chirico’s Il Trovatore
I first saw Il Trovatore at Frieze London on a day when the fair felt especially loud. People drifted in and out of booths, discussing contemporary artists, as I watched the strange distortions of the tent. Dozens of viewers beelined across curated walls. I turned into a quieter corner of the Hauser & Wirth presentation to then face Il Trovatore. When describing…
28/11/2025 HOAS Winter Social
The society’s first independent winter social was a rather successful endeavor, though there was an excess of food, drinks, and an overall sense of debauchery not in the least helped by the choice of entertainment: Fritz Lang’s Metropolis, projected on the screens. The event’s strange circumstances – being Christmas themed, complete with mince pies and…
All Black and Blue
Is it fair to claim that there is something melancholic about the relationship between black people and the sea? A film that encapsulates this dynamic through portraiture, unanimously adored by audiences of all races, is ‘Moonlight’ (2016). Directed by Barry Jenkins, the film’s most vivid cinematography displays the intrinsic connection between black men and the…
In Conversation with Ketty La Rocca: Language and Feminism
In recent weeks, I was introduced to the work of Ketty La Rocca, currently exhibited in the light, snug rooms of the Estorick Collection in Canonbury, Islington. Ketty La Rocca – one of the leading Italian feminist artist of her time, whose life was tragically cut short at just thirty – explored gendered social realities…
Nabi of The Beautiful Icons: Celebrating Maurice Denis’s 155th Birthday
Maurice Denis, born on November 25 in 1870, was a French painter, writer, founder of the Nabi movement and its influential theoretician. His seminal work on art theory, aesthetics and spirituality contributed to the formation of key 20th century art movements including favism, cubism and abstract art. Today Paper Galleries celebrate Denis’s 155th birthday, his…
Jeanne Hébuterne: The Artist Behind the Muse
Jeanne Hébuterne: model, lover, muse. The subject of 26 portraits by Italian modernist painter and sculptor, Modigliani, she was also his partner and mother to his child. But Hébuterne had a life of her own. In fact, she was an artist in her own right, who demonstrated a gift for drawing at an early age.…
How Contemporary Art Fairs Shape Future Art History: The Case Study of Frieze London
Throughout history market forces have played a crucial role in shaping artistic canons; from Renaissance patronage and court painters to nineteenth-century commercial galleries, the market has consistently influenced which artists are perceived as the most important in art history. In the twenty-first century, an era marked by big corporations and globalism, the responsibility for shaping…
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