See the finest art this April

The House of Annie Lennox– curated in partnership with The V&A, London, brings together an array of stunning photographs, iconic videos, and a dazzling selection of costumes, which chart Annie’s unique career from its early beginnings, through her time in The Tourists and Eurythmics, as well as her hugely successful solo career, to the present. The show also includes two photographic portraits of the artist from the Gallery’s permanent collection until 30th June. Scottish National Portrait Gallery, 1 Queen Street, Edinburgh. www.nationalgalleries.org/portrait

Tom Hammick: Night Sky
– an exhibition of woodcut’s exploring English landscape as metaphor; for the human condition, state of mind and a sense of love and loss for our natural world. Flowers Gallery, 21 Cork Street, London, W1. Until 20th April. www.flowersgallery.com

Wilhelm Lehmbruck
– Michael Warner Gallery present an exhibition of the first German sculpture to significantly impact art on an international scale. Featuring a great selection of sculptures as well as related etchings and works on paper. Michael Werner Gallery, 22 Upper Brook Street, London W1. Until 11th May. www.michaelwerner.com

Here There and Somewhere In Between
; The Royal Academy at Hatfield House. The historic gardens of Hatfield House will be showing a group of sculptural works by six Royal Academicians; Ann Christopher, Richard Deacon, Alison Wilding, Bill Woodrow, Michael Craig-Martin and Gary Hume. Hatfield House, Hatfield, Hertfordshire. From 30th March until 29th Sept. www.hatfield-house.co.uk

Metropolis: Reflections on the Modern City
is a showcase of international contemporary artwork jointly collected by Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery and The New Art Gallery Walsall as part of the £1 million Art Fund International initiative. Birmindham Museum & Art Gallery, Chamberlian Square, Birmingham. Until 23rd June. www.bmag.org.uk

Pictures of Paintings – Pierre Bergian. An exhibition of oil paintings and sketches by the Belgium artist Pierre Bergian. His painting capture emptiness and light in space; a notion that fascinates the artist and makes his work often resemble still lives. Purdy Hicks Gallery, 65 Hopton Street, Bankside, London, SE1. From 27th Mar until 27th Apr. www.purdyhicks.com

An Outbreak of Talent
; An exhibition of popular talent noted by Paul Nash in 1935 including Eric Ravilious, Edward Bawden, Edward Burra, Barnett Freedman. & Enid Marx. The Fry Art Gallery, Castle Street, 
Saffron Walden, Essex. From 31st Mar until 30th June. www.fryartgallery.org

Lynn Chadwick: Evolution in Sculpture. Chadwick was one of the most important sculptures and brought an innovative approach to the construction of sculpture working with welded metal of stolit. The exhibition will spread across two sites: Abbot Hall Art Gallery and Blackwell, the Arts & Crafts House, where some of Chadwick’s sculptures will be positioned outside against the dramatic backdrop of Windermere and the Lakeland Fells. Blackwell, the Arts and crafts House, Bowness-on-Windermere, Cumbria. From 28th Mar until 15th June. www.lakelandartstrust.org.uk

Geoffrey Farmer: The Surgeon and the Photographer.
It is Geoffrey Farmers first major exhibition in a UK public gallery. The exhibition is made up of 365 hand-puppets from book images clipped and glued to fabric forms, Farmer will populate The Curve with this recently completed puppet calendar. The Curve, Barbican Centre, London. From 26th Mar until 28th July. www.barbican.org.uk

Life and Death in Pompeii and Herculaneum. The exhibition will transport visitors to the life and times of the people of the Roman cities Pompeii and Herculaneum. It will look at daily life before the devastating volcanic eruption of nearly 2000 years ago, and give some perspective on the domestic context. The focus will be on the ordinary Roman and the realities of home-life. Reading Room, British Museum
, Great Russell Street
, London, WC1. From Mar 28th until 29th Sept. www.britishmuseum.org.uk

Moore and Rodin: Giants of Modern Sculpture
in Major New Exhibition. a major exhibition which compares the work of Moore with one of the pioneers of modern sculpture – Auguste Rodin. 29th March until 27th October. The Henry Moore Foundation
, Perry Green, Herts. www.henry-moore.org

In Cloud Country: Abstracting from nature – from John Constable to Rachel Whiteread. The exhibition brings together a diverse range of works on paper spanning four centuries and features artists such as John Constable, John Sell Cotman, Henry Moore and Rachel Whiteread. 29th March until 30th June. http://www.harewood.org/art-at-harewood

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Outsider Art from Japan. The exhibition brings together more than 300 works for the first major display of Japanese outsider art in the UK. The 46 artists represented in the show are residents and day patients at social welfare institutions across the main island of Honshu, and they present diverse bodies of work including ceramics, textiles, paintings, sculpture and drawings. 28th March until 30th June. The Wellcome Collection, 183 Euston Road, London. www.wellcomecollection.org

Cantus Arcticus
: an arctic landscape imagined through light and sound. Celebrating a year of light in spectacular fashion, Waddesdon Manor will unveil Cantus Arcticus, an extraordinary artwork by international artist Bruce Munro, to be seen for the first time this spring in the Coach House as part of Waddesdon’s contemporary programme. British artist Bruce Munro is best known for immersive large-scale mixed-media installations based on his interest in the medium of light. 27 March until 27 October. Waddesdon Manor, Waddesdon, Near Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire. www.waddesdon.org.uk

Beastly Hall: From the home of the historic Queen’s Beasts topiary at Hall Place & Gardens, ‘a place where artists and creatures collide.’ With curious parallels to these topiary beasts, the exhibition, curated by London-based curatorial collective Artwise, will feature contemporary ‘creatures’ imagined by artists along with subversive responses to the idea of beasts. 28th March until 1st Sept. Beastley Hall, Hall Place & Gardens, Bourne Road, Bexley, Kent. www.bexleyheritagetrust.org.uk

Exhibition on a neglected Campden artist. Court Barn Museum, will be showing the work of a neglected Cotswold artist, Reginald Sharpley. Sharpley was an accomplished draughtsman on account of his rigorous training, he also worked in oils and as an etcher. Much of his work was made in the Cotswolds, an area that he loved both as artist and rider to hounds. His work is accomplished, uncomplicated and evocative of the pre-War world in Campden and the Cotswolds. 28th March until 2nd June. Court Barn Museum, Church Street, Chipping Campden, Gloucestershire. www.courtbarn.org.uk

Bright Land: West of the Rockies, South of the Thames.
The exhibition celebrates the Canadian Artist in Residence Liz Charsley-Jory, inspired by the Gallery’s 2011 blockbuster show ‘Painting Canada: Tom Thomson and the Group of Seven. ‘Bright Land’ will feature work created by Charsley-Jory this year along with a selection of exceptional works by students of all ages from throughout the year’s programme of courses and events which she led and coordinated, including her two sell-out Masterclasses as part of the Gallery’s Public Programmes strand. 25th March until 19th May. Dulwich Picture Gallery, Gallery Road, London, SE2. www.dulwichpicturegallery.org.uk

Perspectives on Love:
An insight into the passionate inner life of Stanley Spencer, a theme of the show comprises his two marriages. 28th March – 3rd November. Stanley Spencer Gallery, High Street, Cookham, Berks. www.stanleyspencer.org.uk

A Picturesque tour of Norfolk and Normandy
. A series of watercolours by Gerard Stamp exploring Norfolk’s Norman architecture, painted to accompany a new exhibition of John Sell Cotman’s watercolours. 30th March until 29th Sept. The Old Kitchens, Gunton Hall, Norfolk. www.gerardstamp.com

Simon Gales: The Eye-line Series.
A new series of painting in which Gales has eliminated the central object, and in so doing opened up an acute sense of space. Power is therefore generated across the painting rather than remaining static in the middle forcing the onlooker’s gaze to move, spanning the image from side to side. Jonathan Cooper, Park Walk Gallery, Park Walk, London, SW1. From 3rd until 20th April. www.jonathancooper.co.uk

Sir Stanley Spencer; dedicated to the work of an extraordinary artist. The exhibition is dedicated to the artist Sir Stanley Spencer, one of the greatest British painters of the 20th century, who became synonymous with Cookham, the village he immortalized, which shaped his work throughout his career. Stanley Spencer Gallery, High Street, Cookham, Berks. until 31st October. www.stanleyspencer.org.uk

John Eardley by Christopher Andreae. The exhibition remembers Joan Eardley fifty year since her death. It compliments a new publication by Christopher Andreae and exhibits works from Townhead to Catterline and from studies abroad in France and Italy. From 3rd until 27th April. The Scottish Gallery, 16 Dundas Street, Edinburgh. www.scottish-gallery.co.uk

Andrzej Jackowski Paintings, Drawings and Prints. The paintings show Jackowski’s own experiences of dispossession, distant recollections of his family history in Poland and the first eleven years of his life spent in a refugee camp. These, along with photo albums and other empemera are the raw materials of his images. From 5th April until 17th May. University Gallery, Northumbria University, Sandyford Road, Newcastle Upon Tyne. www.universitygallery.co.uk

Hughie O’Donoghue prints. The current exhibition includes monotype and carborundum prints made in Venice 2011 and London 2012. Personal liberty and transformation emerge as the main themes through out the prints along with history, memory and idenity that are all embodied within the paintings. From 5th April until 17th May. University Gallery, Northumbria University, Sandyford Road, Newcastle Upon Tyne. www.universitygallery.co.uk

Modern Materials: Abbot Hall’s British Sculpture Collection. This display, featuring rarely seen works from the Lakeland’s Arts Trust’s permanent collection, will show that there is more to sculpture than just bronze and marble. A wonderfully diverse exhibition showing a variety of material demonstrates how inventive British sculpture can be. 4th April until 30th June. Abbot Hall Art Gallery and Museum of Lakeland Life and Industry Kendal, Cumbria. www.lakelandartstrust.org.uk

Making Waves: Mixed-media paintings by John Thornton.
The exhibition will show his mixed media works that incorporate inks, acrylics and watercolours to achieve the fluidity that he seeks, along with found materials, such as sand, shells & rope. His powerful & dramatic seascapes enable you to hear the roar of the sea and to feel that you are standing on the edge of the cliff or beach, whereas his woodland scenes have a contrasting calm and peaceful atmosphere, & also often incorporate water. 6th April until 30th May. Kentmere House Gallery, 53 Scarcroft Hill, York. www.kentmerehouse.co.uk

Landscapes, Seascapes, and Cityscapes – Chris Mcloughlin, Colin Taylor, and Mathew Thompson. Chris McLoughlin takes inspiration from the landscape, with bold brush marks, vibrant colours, light and shadows he creates exciting and evocative paintings that capture the imagination and essence of the subject. Colin Taylor is an outdoor enthusiast with a keen interest in climbing and travelling, both of which are his inspiration for painting. Matthew Thompson works in mixed media of paints, charcoal and pastels creating a passionate and expressive take on everyday, urban scenes. These three vibrant artists create a lively exhibition featuring landscapes, seascapes and cityscapes. 5th until 26th April. Wendy J Levy Gallery, 1st Floor Gallery, 17 Warburton Street, Didsbury, Manchester. www.wendyjlevy-art.com

Adam de Boer Debut UK solo exhibition.
American-Indonesian artist Adam de Boer addresses his hybrid cultural identity through hybrid paintings. By bringing Javanese folk art techniques together with contemporary lo-fi aesthetics and highly traditional subject matter with strikingly modern scenes, he expresses the disjuncture of coming from two quite disparate cultures. Until 4th May. Riflemaker, 79 Beak Street, Regent Street, London, W1F. www.riflemaker.org

The Royal Institute of Painters in Watercolours.
The Mall Galleries in London will be the venue for this exciting collaboration of member’s work which will be hung with submitted work from selected artists across the UK and Europe. The exhibition will be showing fine contemporary watercolours, painted using diverse styles and techniques using water-based mediums on paper. Part of the exhibition will feature Trees & Landscapes. 5th until 18th April. Mall Galleries, The Mall, London SW1. www.royalinstituteofpaintersinwatercolours.org.uk

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CLOSING SOON

The Scottish Gallery March Exhibitions – Diving for Pearls – the innovative use of pearls by an international collection of contemporary jewellers; Anne Redpath – Paintings and Works on Paper; Clive Bowen at 70 – ceramic ware from the North Devon-based artist; Claire Harkess – Indian Tigerlands: paintings inspired by India. At The Scottish Gallery,16 Dundas Street, Edinburgh until 30 Mar. www.scottish-gallery.co.uk

Man Ray: Contacts – an extremely rare collection of Man Ray contact prints from a private collection, including some of the artist’s most celebrated images alongside rarely seen portraits of Hemingway, Picasso, Braque and James Joyce, at Atlas Gallery, 49 Dorset Street, London W1 until 30 March. www.atlasgallery.com

Nicholas Romeril: Sand Surf Stone – 50 new paintings that capture the essence of the artist’s native Jersey. He uses canvas and slate to produce versatile motifs of sand dunes, boulders and foaming seas that allow him to encapsulate not only the raw power of nature, but also its beauty and serenity. At Chris Beetles Gallery, 8 and 10 Ryder Street, London SW1 until 30 Mar.  

Eileen Hogan: Vacant Possession.
For her first exhibition at Roche Court, Eileen Hogan has painted a series of beautiful and evocative works in response to the garden created by Ian Hamilton Finlay at Little Sparta. Hogan’s Little Sparta paintings convey the respite and escape offered by isolation and remoteness: physically empty but potent with metaphor, her paintings are both homage to Finlay and a form of memorial to him. However the works are also completely expressive of Hogan herself, marked by her handling of intense colour, tone, light and shade; they are simultaneously painterly and poetic, restrained and precise. At Roche Court, East Winterslow, Salisbury from 9 Feb – 31 March 2013. sculpture.uk.com (see review in Country Life 27 Feb)

Ian Hamilton Finlay: Selected Works. Ian Hamilton Finlay was an inventive artist as well as a concrete poet. Renowned for works which played with the juxtaposition of word and image, the works selected for this exhibition are evidence of the imagery and metaphor Finlay found in antiquity and Neo-Classicism, which he sometimes combines with a very particular sense of humour. The presentation of Eileen Hogan’s paintings of Finlay’s garden, Little Sparta, alongside his work at Roche Court gives us an understanding of the alchemy that can result from siting a work of art within a landscape: always dependent on the time of day, and quality of light and atmosphere: a magical, ephemeral experience. At Roche Court, East Winterslow, Salisbury from 9 Feb – 31 March 2013. sculpture.uk.com

A Garden within a Flower – solo show of glass artwork by Adam Aaronson inspired by 17th century Dutch flower paintings. Alongside these, new and exciting large-scale pieces from Aaronson’s seminal ‘Landscape’ series are exhibited. At ZeST Contemporary Glass Gallery, Roxby Place, London SW6 until 30 Mar. 020 7610 3344

Panta Rhei – Keith Tyson: Recent Paintings. Panta Rhei, which translates as “everything flows” in Ancient Greek, embodies the idea of a world in perpetual motion, a fundamental concept for Tyson. This exhibition of sixteen paintings by the Turner Prize recipient shows his broad poetic, musical, and personal inspirations over the last three years. At Pace, 6 Burlington Gardens, London W1S from 7 Feb – 28 March 2013. www.pacegallery.com

José Parlà: Broken Languages. José Parlá’s work explores the multi-layered histories of the world’s cities; he creates large-scale paintings and site-specific installations in urban settings. This collection of paintings, works on paper, photographs and sculptures acts as a record of Parlá’s journeys through unknown city streets, providing a personal narrative of his experiences and a record of the people’s stories he discovers on his journeys. At Haunch of Venison, London W1S from 8 Feb – 28 March 2013. haunchofvenison.com


Drawing: Dawn Chorus
– bringing together new works acquired in 2011-2012 (until 31 Mar 2013) & Contested Ground – drawing on the Gallery’s rich collections, exploring the revision of the landscape tradition in British art throughout the last century (until 31 Mar 2013) At Leeds Art Gallery, The Headrow, Leeds

Wendy Ramshaw – Rooms of Dreams – key pieces spanning the past 50 years of the designer who is renowned for her jewellery and large-scale public art. At Dovecot Studios, 10 Infirmary Street, Edinburgh until 30 March. www.dovecotstudios.com

Albert Irvin: Gouaches 1979-96. One of the country’s admired abstract painters, Bert Irvin is known for his bold, invigorating paintings, including painterly motifs of squares, circles, lines and crosses. This exhibition concentrates on a collection of his gouaches. At University Gallery, Newcastle, University Gallery & Baring Wing, Northumbria University
Sandyford Road, Newcastle upon Tyne 15 Feb to 29 March. www.universitygallery.co.uk

Dale Atkinson: Paintings. Atkinson is interested in the ‘psychology of paint’, the way in which a chance mark or colour can change the identity or meaning of a piece. When he is working he frequently turns the canvas allowing the paint to dictate the form and the story. At University Gallery, Newcastle, University Gallery & Baring Wing, Northumbria University, Sandyford Road
Newcastle upon Tyne 15 Feb to 29 March. www.universitygallery.co.uk

A Bigger Splash: Painting after Performance – bringing together a range of key works by over 40 artists, including Yves Klein, Jackson Pollock and Cindy Sherman, moving through half a century of painting, video and photography, alongside archival and documentary material, this major group exhibition will show how the key period of post-war performance art has challenged and energized the medium of painting for successive generations. At Tate Modern, Southbank, London SE1 until 1 Apr 2013. www.tate.org.uk

Mughal India: Art, Culture and Empire at the British Library, 96 Euston Road, London NW1 until 2 Apr. www.bl.uk

Percy Kelly – bringing together the Cumbrian artist’s exquisite artwork alongside his distinctive illustrated letters from the Lakeland Arts Trust collection. Abbot Hall Art Gallery and Museum, Kendal, Cumbria from 18 Jan to 1 Apr. www.lakelandartstrust.org.uk

At The Foot O’ Yon Excellin’
Brae -Helen Macalister’s elegant, reductive works which explore a specific distilled cultural/political history. Paintings, drawings, prints and glass reflect her poetic use of language in which Gaelic and Scots are part of her subject matter. At Art First, 21 Eastcastle Street, London W1 until 6 Apr. www.artfirst.co.uk

Craigie Aitchison: A Private Collection
– the largest private collection of works by the late Scottish artist and Royal Academician which was brought together by Sheelagh Cluney, his long-standing patron and friend. 50 paintings created between 1978 and 2006 on show at Waddington Custot Galleries, 16 Percy Street, London W1 until 6 April. (see review in Country Life 6 March 2013)

Joe Tilson: A Survey – paintings, constructions and reliefs from 1956 to the present. At Marlborough Fine Art, 6 Albemarle Street, London W1 until 5 Apr. www.marlboroughfineart.com

Makiko Nakamura – Paintings 2011-2012. At John Martin Gallery, 38 Albemarle Street, London W1 until 6 Apr. wwwjmlondon.com

John Bellany: Epic Journey Through Life
– following the acclaimed recent retrospective at the Scottish National Gallery to mark his 70th birthday, a retrospective of paintings, watercolours and drawings spanning five decades by the influential Scottish painter. The richly symbolic works cover a number of subjects which together stand as a witness to the artist’s acknowledgement of who he is and where he comes from. At Beaux Arts London, 22 Cork Street, London W1 until 6 April. www.beauxartslondon.co.uk

Antony Williams – portraits and still lives in egg tempera by the artist who rose to public prominence in May 1996 with his frank portrait of HM The Queen. At Messums, 8 Cork Street, London W1 until 6 April. www.messums.com

Dr Livingstone, I Presume?
Discover the story of the Scottish missionary and explorer through new research, the Museum’s African collections and Livingstone’s personal possessions. The exhibition explores his early life in Scotland, how he became the first European to cross the African continent, and his efforts to abolish the slave trade and introduce Christianity. At the National Museum of Scotland, Chambers Street, Edinburgh
23 Nov – 7 April. www.nms.ac.uk/

Land and Landscape: The Painting of James Morrison – a retrospective marking the 80th birthday of one of Scotland’s finest landscape artists with works ranging from 1950s pictures of his home city Glasgow to more recent landscapes inspired by rural and coastal Scotland and trips overseas. Alongside will be a smaller show of etchings by the influential late 18th century Scottish landscape artist John Clerk of Eldin commemorating the 200th anniversary of his death. At The Fleming Collection, 13 Berkeley Street, London W1 from 19 Feb to 6 Apr. www.flemingcollection.com

49th Winter Exhibition
– 6 new paintings by Colin Jellicoe. A changing mixed exhibition of drawings paintings and graphics by 20 gallery artists. These artists have a cinematic style, frames look like film stills. November 20 to April 6 2013. At 82 Portland street, Manchester, M1 4QX.

John Hubbard: Landscapes
– a display of the American artist’s landscapes of Dorset and Cornwall, recently acquired through a gift by the Monument Trust and the artist: Pallant House Gallery, Chichester until 7 Apr. www.pallant.org.uk

Rosemarie Trockel
– A Cosmos – exploring the relationship between different disciplines, A Cosmos includes new work from the German artist that has never been seen in the UK before, presented in the company of a variety of objects and artifacts with which she feels an affinity, racing a historical lineage from the early cabinets of curiosities, to natural history and modern art museums, through to the white cube of contemporary galleries. At Serpentine Gallery, Kensington Gardens, London W2 until 7 Apr.

Lucknow to Lahore: Fred Bremner’s Vision of India – a collection of beautiful and rarely seen photographs which offers a fascinating insight into the role played by Scots in the British Raj. At Scottish National Portrait Gallery, 1 Queen Street, Edinburgh from 6 Oct to 7 Apr. www.nationalgalleries.org

John Piper: The Mountains of Wales. John Piper’s bold paintings of the mountains of North Wales explore the artist’s relationship with the landscape, rock, and sky which surrounded him in the 1940s and 50s. At the Whitworth Art Gallery, Oxford Road, Manchester until 7 April 2013. www.whitworth.manchester.ac.uk

Giorgio Morandi: Lines of Poetry – a career spanning exhibition of works by the master of poetic understatement Giorgio Morandi (1890-1964). At Estorick Collection, 39a Canonbury Square, London N1 from 16 Jan to 7 April. www.estorickcollection.com

Greywalls – A Work of Art – showing the work of ten artists commissioned to paint various aspects of the historic Lutyens house Greywalls. Artists include Ann Fraser, Christine Woodside, Hugh Dodd, Matt Curtis and Maggie Vance. At Gullane Art Gallery, 8 Stanley Road, Gullane, East Lothian until 7 Apr. www.gullaneartgallery.co.uk

Sam Cartman: At the End of the Road
– paintings on show at Kilmorack Gallery, by Beauly, Invernessshire until 13 Apr. www.kilmorackgallery.co.uk

Geedon Gallery Spring Exhibition 2013. The Gallery, which is situated in an attractive barn conversion overlooking the River Coln estuary in north Essex, will be exhibiting 20th and 21st century paintngs, sculptures, ceramics and prints by leading British artists including Anthony Atkinson ARCA, Julian Bailey NEAC,Fred Cuming RA NEAC, Ken Howard OBE RA NEAC,Pamela Kay RWS, Gill Brown NDD and Prue Cooper. At Geedon Gallery, Jaggers, Fingringhoe, Colchester, Essex from 23 Mar to 7 Apr and thereafter by appointment until 15th May. www.geedongallery,co.uk

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