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We have just returned from my favourite Hay Festival where I spoke with the legendary (faithful) David Olusoga about my book, How To Live An Artful Life, and hosted kids events for The Story of Art without Men: An Illustrated Guide to Amazing Women Artists.

Scroll on for my British Museum Kids Book Club (!) and, as always, top reads, things to see, do, watch and listen to! Have a great month. Love Katy xxx

TALK: 10 July, 6.30pm: Iconic Female Artists at Tate Modern – sold out; livestream tickets available

On Friday 10 July, I’ll be at Tate Modern discussing the powerful practices of Tracey Emin, Frida Kahlo and Ana Mendieta — at the rare moment that these three great women artists are all exhibiting at Tate. In-person tickets have sold out, but you can book a livestream ticket here!

BONUS EPISODE: The Great Women Artists Podcast: Joan Snyder

When I was in NYC in April, I visited the studio of legendary painter Joan Snyder, whose new show Earthsongs opens tomorrow, 6 June, at Thaddeus Ropac Paris (until 25 Jul). We discussed the power of music (and our love of Philip Glass); her journey from sociology to art – and the conviction to get herself into graduate school; plus, how important it is to teach art to kids. Joan is awesome. Listen here.

“I mean, that was what compelled me to keep painting… I was pretty self-taught because I didn't have those beginning classes. I didn't have that structure. I didn't have any of that. So, in some ways, I think that served me well. Maybe not for all students, but it definitely served me well – not to have too much instruction.”

On Substack: What to see at London Gallery Weekend 2026

It’s London Gallery Weekend, and the city is full with exhibitions, talks, tours, performances, and more — all totally free to attend. Check out my top picks here.

Plus don’t miss Hauser & Wirth’s Literary Evening, tonight (Friday 5 June), 5:30pm – hosted by Ben Luke, with readings from myself and many more.

On Substack: A new discovery: Louise Janin

As the first UK solo exhibition dedicated to Louise Janin opens this week, I spoke to curators Simon Grant and Vivienne Roberts about this visionary artist, whose work melds East Asian influences with surrealism, spiritualism, and more. Check it out!

On Substack: Dada Masilo’s Hamlet

Ahead of the UK premiere of Dada Masilo’s Hamlet at Sadler’s Wells, longtime collaborator Suzette Le Sueur told me about Masilo’s radical reimagining of Hamlet through Ophelia’s eyes. Read here.

On Substack: Briony Fer on Sophie Taeuber-Arp

Click here for highlights from my conversation with art historian Briony Fer on artist, designer and avant-garde icon Sophie Taeuber-Arp.

British Museum Kids Book Club!

I went to the British Museum to answer some kids’ questions, including: “Who would you want to paint a portrait of you?” and, “Why do we see more works by male artists than female artists in museums?” Along the way we looked at works by Mary Delaney, Clara Peeters, Tracey Emin and the Guerrilla Girls. Watch here!

And now for June’s recommendations!

16 shows to see in the UK:

• Frida Kahlo: The Making of an Icon, Tate Modern, London (until 3 Jan 2027)

• Paula Rego: Visions of English Literature, Newlands House Gallery, Petworth (until 6 Sept)

• Eileen Agar, Alison Jacques, London (until 25 Jul)

• Mrinalini Mukherjee: Unbound Forms - Women Sculptors of India and Bangladesh, Hepworth Wakefield (until 25 Oct)

• Georgia-May Cook: Picnic Lightning, Union Pacific, London (until 18 Jul)

• Jemila Isa: Dreams Lost Upon Waking, Maureen Paley, London (until 25 Jul)

• Olivia Plender: Little Fennel’s Complaint, Modern Art Oxford (until 16 Aug)

• Project a Black Planet: The Art and Culture of Panafrica, Barbican, London (until 6 Sep)

• Roni Horn: Seizure of Hope, Hauser & Wirth, London (until 1 Aug)

• Andrew Cranston and Lorna Robertson: Painting, our mutual friend, Glasgow Print Studio (until 1 Aug)

• Louise Janin: The Echo of the Spirit Through the Rhythms of Life at GPS Gallery, London (3–7 Jun) (read my q&a with the curators here!)

• To the Dance: Eight works by Nancy Spero 1926–2009, Frith Street Gallery Golden Square, London (until 7 Aug)

• Gladys Hynes: Radical Lives, Charleston in Lewes (until 11 Oct)

• Nomenclature for the Time Being, Raven Row, London (until 6 Sep)

• Lara Shahnavaz: Dust, Ginny on Frederick, London (until 12 Jun)

• Phyllida Barlow: disruptor, Wolterton, Norwich (until 31 Oct)

13 shows to see outside of the UK:

• Firelei Baez: feet squelching on wet grass, nourished by uncertainty, Hauser & Wirth, New York (until 31 Jul)

• Tilda Swinton: Ongoing, Onassis Foundation, Athens (until 28 Jun)

• Emily Kam Kngwarray: The Turning Season, Pace Gallery, New York (until 14 Aug)

• Body. Ideal, Gaze, Freedom, Gothenburg Museum of Art, Gothenburg (until 17 Jan)

• Betty Parsons / Carla Accardi, Peter Marino Art Foundation, Southampton, NY (until 3 Oct)

• Whitney Biennial 2026, Whitney Museum, New York (until 23 Aug)

• The Cubists: Inventing Modern Vision, Center Pompidou Hanwha, Seoul

• Carol Rama: I See You You See Me, Hauser & Wirth, New York (until 31 Jul)

• Aleksandra Waliszewska: Irruption of Antiquity, Benaki Museum of Greek Culture, Athens (until 27 Sep)

• Christina Kubisch: The Emergence of Sound, Ludwig Forum, Aachen (until 20 Sep)

• MOTHER: Stories from the NGV Collection, NGV, Melbourne (until 12 Jul)

• Camille Henrot: Paper Planes, Copenhagen Contemporary (until 31 Dec)

• Joan Snyder: Earthsongs, Thaddeus Ropac, Paris (until 25 Jul)

5 things to read:

• Vocal Break by Lauren Elkin

• Graphic rebellion: The women who made the West Coast Modern, via A Rabbit’s Foot

• Land by Maggie O’Farrell

• Leïla Slimani on Goya and the relationship between literature and painting, via The Guardian

• Issue 27 of The Fence

Things to watch:

Recently I’ve loved delving into MUBI’s eight-film collection Frederick Wiseman: American Lives, dedicated to the unique American documentarian (1930–2026) who travelled the country with modest equipment – handheld cameras and portable mics – to record the institutions and people that make up modern life.

From Model (1980), a behind-the-scenes look at the modelling industry, to In Jackson Heights (2015), a generous ode to a New York City neighbourhood threatened by gentrification; the eight films in this MUBI collection make up a moving portrait of the full spectrum of human behaviour and emotion.

I was drawn to Wiseman’s films for the way his open, non-judgemental approach makes space for the small gestures, expressions and idiosyncrasies that shape people’s everyday lives, and which together reveal something much larger about the world we live in.

In many ways Wiseman reminds me of one of my favourite artists, the great American photographer Diane Arbus (1923–1971). Led by an empathetic curiosity, both Wiseman and Arbus chronicled American lives through a lens of strangeness and familiarity, wonder and honesty – and in doing so, insisted on the beauty that underlies it all.

Frederick Wiseman: American Lives is now streaming on MUBI in Australia, India, Turkey, Netherlands, Spain, Germany, Ireland, UK, Argentina, Chile, Brazil, Colombia, and Mexico. You can get 30 days free at mubi.com/katyhessel.

5 things to do in London

• The Great Exhibition Road Festival, South Kensington, 6–7 Jun

• William Kentridge in conversation, Royal Academy, 17 Jun, 6:30pm

• Sarah Churchwell on Marilyn Monroe, National Portrait Gallery, 19 Jun, 7pm

• An evening with Olivia Laing and Charlie Porter celebrating 10 years of The Lonely City, Union Chapel, 23 Jun 7pm

• Counterpoints Lecture with Elif Shafak, Southbank Centre, 27 Jun, 2pm

5 artists to know

Margo Hoff (1910–2008)

Christina Forrer (b.1978)

Carrie Stettheimer (1869–1944)

Monika Correa (b.1938)

Minnette de Silva (1918–1998)

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Scroll on for my top picks, divided into four parts – East, Central, West and South London. Enjoy!

East London

Exhibitions:

• Sara Cwynar: Baby Blue Benzo, The Approach, E2

• Georgia-May Travers Cook: Picnic Lightning, Union Pacific, E1

• Unyimeabasi Udoh: No Vehicles, Alma Pearl, N1

• Yvonne Mabs Francis: Breakdown, Yamamoto Keiko Rochaix, E1

• Shahzia Sikander: High Seas; Closed Skies, Victoria Miro, N1

• Paul Majek: Losing a Home, House of Annetta, E1

• Lara Shahnavaz: Dust, Ginny on Frederick, EC1M

Events:

• Artist Studio Visit: with Ana Viktoria Dzinic | Sun 7 Jun, 11am – book here

• Exhibition Walkthrough: Yvonne Mabs Francis, tour led by Carol Maund at Yamamoto Keiko Rochaox | Sun 7 Jun, 2pm – book here

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Central London

Exhibitions:

• Camille Henrot: Don’t, The Perimeter, WC1

• Francis Picabia & Roni Horn, Hauser & Wirth, W1

• Christo and Jeanne-Claude: Air, Gagosian, W1

• Eileen Agar, Alison Jacques, W1

• SLG Forever, Christie’s, SW1

• Alice Macdonald: Every Window is a Holiday, Cedric Bardawil, W1

• Lisa Jahovic: Soft Interpretations, Flowers Gallery Cork St, W1

• Ree Morton: Signs and Gestures, Richard Saltoun Gallery, W1

• Lubaina Himid and Magda Stawarska: Zanzibar, Lisson Gallery, NW1

• Hayv Kahraman: What cannot be said will be wept, Pilar Corrias Conduit Street, W1

• Hybridity and Belonging in Contemporary Art, Sundaram Tagore Gallery, SW1

• Isabelle Young: Venice As I Was, Canopy Collections, WC1A

• Prunella Clough: Out and About, Thomas Dane Gallery, SW1

• Candace Hill-Montgomery: A Bare Woman Mutters Nothing…, Hollybush Gardens, EC1

• Anne Imhof: Citizen, Sprüth Magers, W1

• Ida Ekblad: Eat an Eggplant, Galerie Max Hetzler, W1

Events:

• In Conversation: Ida Ekblad and Marie-Charlotte Carrier at Galerie Max Hetzler | Thurs 4 Jun, 6pm – book here

• Performance: Dayo Ade at Larkin Durey | Fri 5 Jun 11:30am – book here

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Janin’s work melds East Asian influences with surrealism, spiritualism, and more. They’re like cascading waterfalls meets the swirls of a racetrack – and totally mesmerising. Ahead of the exhibition (3–7 June), I interviewed him and his co-curator, Vivienne Roberts, who I met a few years ago at the Madge Gill show at the William Morris Gallery. Over to Simon and Vivienne!

Please can you describe Janin’s paintings for us?

Encountering the paintings of Louise Janin is like entering a world where colour, rhythm and spiritual energy become tangible. You are drawn into their hypnotic qualities, with flowing forms that merge the organic and the geometric, creating images that feel both familiar and otherworldly.

Rather than depicting the visible world literally, Janin sought to reveal the invisible forces that animate it, including sound, energy and the rhythms of the cosmos. Her harmonious compositions unfold like visual music, inviting the viewer to experience them as much through the senses as through sight. You do not simply look at them; you almost hear and feel them.

Is there one work that sticks out to you: which is it, and why?

Simon: I love the painting called Ascension (below left). It depicts a sense of the organic elements of natural forms but also hints at her fascination for exploring invisible worlds.

Vivienne: For me, it is The Sensitive Line (below right) which looks like it was created using the technique of automatism. I imagine Janin letting go of all constraints, feeling the pencil and brush moving instinctively and finding their own rhythm. I see the work as a portal to freedom and adventure.

Janin was born in New Hampshire in 1893, and was raised in San Francisco. I know that she was enchanted by her father’s extensive collection of Chinese art. Tell us more about this.

These youthful times became the bedrock of her artistic development, rooted in her growing fascination with Buddhist, Taoist and Hindu ideas and beliefs that would remain with her throughout her long life. Possibly initially the ideas of myth, fantasy and beauty, but most likely also the visual aspect of the pictures, elements of which such as Xiangyun (traditional Chinese stylized clouds – below right), would find their way into her paintings (below left).

In the earlier work she depicted famous mythological stories in figurative works that were highly symbolic. Within these compositions she would often include forms such as spiralling fronds, fantastical arabesques and wispy, flowing curlicues, symbolising the spiritual realm and the energy of nature. But as her works progressed, these elements that had been peripheral became the focus – as her work moved towards abstraction.

I know that she was very inspired by shan shui pictures. Can you tell us about this, and how her work relates to them?

Shan shui painting style (literally “mountain-water”) originated in fifth century China. Shan shui pictures characteristically featured the natural scenery of mountains, rivers, and waterfalls (below, left). They embodied Taoist and Buddhist principles that emphasised a harmonious, balanced relationship between humans and nature, and aimed to capture the soul of nature rather than its realistic depiction.

A key part of such pictures was the empty spaces known as liubai (literally “leaving blank”) that symbolised infinity, vastness, and an intangible void (below).

As Janin wrote, such painting “is closely linked to philosophies that teach the nothingness of appearances, conflate the real and unreal, and describe how the soul of the sage can sail through vast spaces.”

I love the idea of “liubai” – the intangible void: why do you think we are drawn to that today?

Because it has always been there. The idea of reducing ideas and form to the bare minimum has an ancient history. The idea of reduction stemming from a philosophical concept was present in many cultures. Minimal means could generate potentials for infinite variations. Think of Stéphane Mallarmé’s treatment of the blank page as part of the poem itself, Constantin Brâncuși’s sculpture The Beginning of the World (aka Brâncuși’s egg), Béla Tarr’s cinematic silences or Agnes Martin’s grid paintings.

Was she inspired by spiritualism for her work?

She was moving in circles where ideas about spirituality and art were actively being discussed, including artists such as František Kupka, whom she met in 1926. Like many pioneers of abstraction, Janin was interested in the idea that art could reveal realities beyond ordinary sight.

What about the role of nature?

Nature was central to her way of thinking and existing in the world. In her writing, she often connected her ideas back to the natural world, visible and invisible. Sometimes she talked about worlds beyond. She put it beautifully: “The wonder-filled contemplation of natural harmonies, the vigorous architecture of animals, the gracefulness of plants; the movement of the human body in its games and dances; song and nascent instrumental music… This is the natural, universal genesis of abstract art.”

I love how she compares nature to abstraction, saying: “nature is geometric” – what do you think about that?

It makes total sense. For Janin the spiral was the perfect example of this. It appears in nature in many forms, as well as in imagery across world cultures. The two are inexorably intertwined.

What about music? I love the work “Musicaliste Composition” (1950) and both paintings titled, “Étude Musicaliste”.

Janin said that music was an inexhaustible source of inspiration. Her paintings function as exemplary visual compositions in which form and colour interact rhythmically, creating immersive experiences rather than static images. The viewer is invited to engage with the work as one might engage with music, through sensation and intuition rather than narrative interpretation. The works you mention are great examples of this.

How did she fuse, and borrow, elements from different cultures?

Janin was fascinated by how global cultures developed pictorial languages, and she would often incorporate elements of both straight and curved lines that appear in cultural artefacts – such as the carved spiral designs on the Neolithic stones of Gavrinis in Brittany (far left, below), the zoomorphic designs in Chinese Bronze Age vessels (middle, below):

Or the sinuous, wave-like forms found in New Guinea ritual objects (middle). Janin also liked the intricate glyphs seen in Mayan stone wall decorations (right, below).

Tell us about her “Cosmogrammes” – what are the ideas behind them?

It’s a play on the words ‘cosmos’ and ‘osmosis’. While the seed for the cosmogrammes was sown in 1925 after Janin encountered marbled papers used in book binding, it wasn’t until after the Second World War that she returned to the idea, and began to conduct her own experiments.

Pigments dispersed and accumulated into formations that evoke nebulae, microscopic organisms, or unknown systems. They conjure the mystical ideas of ‘as above, so below’, suggesting the interconnectedness between the microcosm and macrocosm.

The mantic stain techniques of Ithell Colquhoun, the celestograph experiments of August Strindberg, and earlier ‘taches’ by Victor Hugo demonstrate a similar interest in allowing material processes to generate form.

How does her work speak to the world we live in now?

Janin was still exhibiting her work at the age of 100, having lived through extraordinary social, political and cultural upheaval throughout her 80 year career. She embodies resilience and an unwavering belief in the value of artistic vision, even when it must have felt as though her voice was not always heard.

In this respect, she has much in common with other visionary artists such as Hilma af Klint and Georgiana Houghton, who are leading the way in the recent rediscovery of women who have been overlooked in dominant art historical narratives. Like them, Janin created work that invites a more contemplative way of seeing that encourages viewers to slow down, expand perception, and be more open to intuition, emotion, energy, spirituality and sensory experience. Maybe they are tools to deal with the uncertainty of the world we now live in.

Where can we learn more?

At the exhibition ‘Louise Janin: The Echo of the Spirit Through the Rhythms of Life’ at the GPS Gallery, 36 Great Pulteney St, London W1F 9NS, 3-7 June. We are also publishing a small book.

Thank you Simon and Vivienne!

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A new discovery, for me, has been the late South African dancer and choreographer Dada Masilo (1985–2024). She was renowned for her radical and inventive takes on classical ballet, from a queer Swan Lake to a South African Giselle.

Drawing on a mix of African and Western influences for her choreography, Masilo also confronted pressing issues: from the AIDS crisis, to domestic violence, marginalisation, and more. I love what her frequent collaborator, William Kentridge, said of her: “She gave our eyes a wider field of vision.”

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Just like the book, these events will get children, ages 7–14 (and above), excited about art through treasure hunts, quizzes, stories and interactive ‘art tasks’. All welcome!

I want kids (and grown-ups) to know that art can be for everyone: whatever their interests and personalities. Like football? Check out Rose Wylie. Enjoy reading? Find a painting of your favourite author. Interested in the environment? Have a look at p. 136 of the book on Agnes Denes. Poetry? Check out the page on Joan Mitchell and her friend, the poet, James Schuyler.

Come and join me this half term!

& scroll to the bottom for some (free) museums to bring kids along to. And some ideas. For example, why not go to the National Gallery and look for all the cats in paintings? Or, check out the National Portrait Gallery, and find 10 portraits with people wearing glasses! Use museums however you like. They are yours. Xoxo

Sunday 24 May 11am, Charleston Festival, East Sussex: The Story of Art Without Men… For Tweens!

I’ll be at beautiful Charleston, the former home of the Bloomsbury Group, in Sussex this Sunday, 11am for a fast-paced tour of art’s hidden heroes, freedom fighters and trailblazers. Packed with visuals and lively quizzes, this is the perfect event for curious kids (and grown-ups).

Tickets here.

Tuesday 26 May 11am–4pm, National Portrait Gallery, London: Family Day – Book signing + art trail!

Come down to the National Portrait Gallery on Tue 26 May for their fantastic free Family Day, full of fun, workshops, and ‘art trails’ (treasure hunts!).

Pick up our new The Story of Art Without Men Family Trail, available from the Family Art Cart in the Ross Place entrance (all free!). Follow the trail through the gallery and collect a reward at the end from the Ticket Desk.

From 11:30am to 12:30pm, I’ll be doing a book signing of of The Story of Art Without Men: An illustrated Guide in the Main Gallery Shop.

No tickets required, just rock up!

​Thursday 28 May, 10am, Hay Festival, Hay-on-Wye: An interactive journey through The Story of Art Without Men

Next week I’ll be heading to the ‘Town of Books’, Hay-on-Wye, for Hay Festival.

At 10am on Thursday 28th, join me for an interactive event following the story of art across time and across the globe, to discover how amazing women artists changed the world with their art. Along the way we’ll be doing quizzes and ‘art tasks’, so bring pencils and sketchbooks!

Tickets.

ALSO AT HAY: for the adults

On Wednesday 27 May 2026, 7pm: I’ll be talking to the brilliant David Olusoga about all things How to Live an Artful Life. Tickets here.

Our family-friendly event at the Royal Academy has sadly now sold out, but my advice is to get the book and take part in your own art tasks. Like these…

Inspired by Georgia O’Keeffe:

Inspired by Alma Thomas:

Or, Pauline Boty!

15 free of charge UK museums for families:

• National Gallery, London

• Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool (don’t miss the children’s gallery, ‘Big Art for Little Artists’)

• Wolverhampton Art Gallery

• Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum, Glasgow (take part in their Art Competition for Young People)

• Bristol Museum & Art Gallery

• National Museum Cardiff (and their ‘Paint Along’ events)

• Turner Contemporary, Margate (check out the Hulda Guzmán exhibition!)

• The Whitworth, Manchester

• Hove Museum of Creativity (+ a new exhibition about animals in art)

• The Beaney House of Art and Knowledge, Canterbury

• The Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge (kids will love Frank Bowling’s colourful canvases)

• Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art, Gateshead

• Young V&A, London

• Yorkshire Sculpture Park (for an outdoor fix)

• Nottingham Contemporary

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On the GWA Podcast we explored the story of artist, designer and avant-garde icon Sophie Taeuber-Arp with art historian Briony Fer (who has published a stunning book on the artist: ‘Sophie Taeuber-Arp: The Rule of Curves).

Born in Switzerland in 1889, Sophie Taeuber-Arp was an artist, designer, dancer, puppet-maker, teacher, sculptor, archit…

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FAMILY TALK 29 May, 11am – Interactive event at the Royal Academy
– now sold out!

On Friday 29 May, 11am, I’ll be hosting a family-friendly event at the Royal Academy – featuring an interactive talk about amazing women artists (sketching materials provided for younger visitors to draw and respond during the talk). This event has now sold out!

TALK: 10 July, 6.30pm: Iconic Female Artists at Tate Modern

On Friday 10 July, I’ll be at Tate Modern discussing the powerful practices of Tracey Emin, Frida Kahlo and Ana Mendieta — at the rare moment that these three great women artists are all exhibiting at Tate. It should be a fantastic evening – tickets here!

It’s literary festival season, and you can find me at these festivals across the UK:

• Saturday 16 May 7:30pm, Charleston Festival: in conversation with Kate Bryan. Tickets.

• Sunday 17 May 2pm, Bath Literary Festival: in conversation with author Victoria Redel. Tickets.

• Sunday 24 May 11am, Charleston Festival: The Story of Art Without Men… For Tweens! (family event) Tickets.

• Wednesday 27 May 7pm, Hay Festival: in conversation with David Olusoga. Tickets.

• Thursday 28 May 10am, Hay Festival: The Story of Art Without Men: Amazing Women Artists (family event). Tickets.

• Thursday 28 May 2:30pm, Hay Festival — MUBI Cinema: Film screening and discussion. Tickets.

The GWA Podcast: Venice Biennale Special with Lubaina Himid

At this year’s Venice Biennale the British pavilion is filled with the colourful worlds of Lubaina Himid, who came on the GWA podcast to discuss the commission, and how she creates paintings that ‘the audience can climb inside’. Listen here.

The GWA Podcast: Briony Fer on Sophie Taeuber-Arp

Listen to art historian and curator Briony Fer on Sophie Taeuber-Arp: artist, dancer, puppet maker, bag weaver, teacher, sculptor, architect, and more!

The GWA Podcast: Deborah Levy on Gertrude Stein

I met with acclaimed writer Deborah Levy to discuss the pioneering spirit and avant-garde sensibility of Gertrude Stein, the subject of Levy’s latest book. Listen here.

Read: my favourite moments from the episode.

The GWA Podcast: Alyce Mahon on Dorothea Tanning

Dive into the fabulous life and landscapes (both real and imagined) of Dorothea Tanning, as told by the brilliant art historian Alyce Mahon. Listen here.

Plus, check out our recent Substack: The worlds of Dorothea Tanning.

The GWA Podcast: Sonnet Stanfill on Elsa Schiaparelli

I spoke to Sonnet Stanfill, curator of the phenomenal V&A exhibition Elsa Schiaparelli: Fashion Becomes Art, all about the trailblazing designer; her daring life, influences, collaborations, and much more. Listen!

And click here to read our Substack deep dive on Schiaparelli’s dazzling collaborations with surrealist artists.

The GWA Podcast: Diane Apostolos-Cappadona on Mary Magdalene

For an Easter special, world-renowned historian Diane Apostolos-Cappadona joined me to discuss the ‘most flexible figure in art’, Mary Magdalene, and how artists have adopted her image in ways that coincide with their needs, and the needs of the time. Check it out here.

A new family trail at the NPG!

I’m excited to say that we’ve made a The Story of Art Without Men–themed “Family Trail” (or treasure hunt!) with London’s National Portrait Gallery. Read more about it here!

On Substack: All the Art I saw in NYC and DC

After my recent US trip I wrote up a roundup of all the brilliant art I saw in NYC and DC – from Frida Kahlo at MoMA to Mary Cassatt at the NGA, and much more. Read here!

And now for May’s recommendations. Enjoy! Xoxo Katy

14 shows to see in the UK:

• Sylvia Sleigh: The Bridge, Malarkey, London (until 15 Jul)

• Guerrilla Girls, Charleston in Firle (until 6 Sep)

• Abigail Dudley: A place after a place, Alice Amati, London (until 30 May)

• May Morris: Crafting Legacy, Lady Lever Art Gallery, Liverpool (until 1 Nov)

• LR Vandy: Rise, Yorkshire Sculpture Park, Wakefield (until 13 Sep)

• Sophie Smorczewski: sown in slumber, Lamb Gallery, London (until 30 May)

• Michaela Eichwald: MÄR, Maureen Paley, London (until 23 May)

• Gender Stories, Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool (until 31 Aug)

• Grace Weaver: Plaids, Max Hetzler, London (until 28 May)

• Ranti Bam: Sacred Groves, South London Gallery (until 23 Aug)

• Handpicked: Painting Flowers, Kettle’s Yard, Cambridge (until 6 Sep)

• Katharina Grossse: I Set Out, I Walked Fast, White Cube, London (until 31 May)

• Catwalk: The Art of the Fashion Show, V&A Dundee, London (until 17 Jan)

• Nancy Holt at Goodwood Art Foundation, Chichester (until 1 Nov)

11 shows to see outside the UK:

• Venice Biennale 2026: In Minor Keys by Koyo Kouoh (9 May – 22 Nov)

• Edmonia Lewis: Said in Stone, Peabody Essex Museum, Salem (until 7 Jun)

• Anni Albers: Constructing Textiles, Belvedere Museum, Vienna (until 16 Aug)

• Allison Katz: Outta the Bag, Hauser & Wirth, New York (until 24 Jul)

• Paper Gardens: Art, Botany and Empire, MAP Bengaluru (until 5 Jul)

• Lynette Yiadom-Boakye: Many A Moonlit Caveat, Jack Shainman Gallery, New York (until 31 Jul)

• Gertrude Abercrombie: The Whole World Is a Mystery, Milwaukee Art Museum (until 19 Jul)

• New Woman, New Vision: Women Photographers of the Bauhaus, Museum of Photography, Berlin (until 4 Oct)

• GaHee Park: Half-Looking, Half-Seen, Perrotin, New York (until 30 May)

• Hilma af Klint, Grand Palais, Paris (until 30 Aug)

• Francesca Mollett: Buried Shadow, GRIMM, New York (until 18 Jun)

6 things to read:

• Ghost Stories by Siri Hustvedt

• The Story of Printmaking by Holly EJ Black

• Once More, With Feeling: Emily LaBarge on Tracey Emin, via Tate Etc.

• The Great Good Places by Margaret Drabble

• Women Paint Women: Rosemary Hill on Maria Cosway and Élisabeth Louise Vigée Le Brun, via LRB

• The Shadow of the Object by Chloe Aridjis

5 things to listen to/watch

• Lucy Wood on Gwen John via Talk Art

• Samantha Harvey on Writing, Time, and the Shape of a Life via Louisiana Channel

• Lynne Ramsay via Fashion Neurosis with Bella Freud

• Claire Keegan on Service95 Book Club with Dua Lipa

• Lena Dunham via The Interview

5 things to do in London

• Author Talk: Feminism for a World on Fire: Natasha Walter with Carole Cadwalladr and Aja Barber, Conway Hall, 13 May, 7pm

• Artist Talk: Zineb Sedira, Tate Modern, 14 May, 6:30pm

• Film: Exhibition on Screen: Frida Kahlo, cinemas nationwide, from 19 May

• Author Talk: Ruth Ozeki: The Typing Lady, Southbank Centre, 22 May, 7:45pm

• Dance: Dada Masilo’s Hamlet, Sadler’s Wells, 25—26 May

5 artists to know

Mary Herbert (b.1988)

Rita Kernn Larsen (1904–1998)

Gala Porras-Kim (b.1984)

Leonilda González (1923–2017)

Chiara Camoni (b.1974)

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I am just back from the Venice Biennale, where we were struck with a spiritualist experience at the Vatican pavilion’s soundscape work in the Mystical Garden; nude jet-skiers and bell ringers at Florentina Holzinger’s most-talked-about Austrian pavilion; an extraordinary mosaic graffiti-strewn exterior of the German pavilion by Sung Tieu, and interior by Henrike Naumann; Adriana Varejão’s flesh-like paintings at the Brazilian pavilion (listen to the podcast)…

We witnessed Matthew Wong’s paintings of interiors; Lorna Simpson’s cosmic images of meteorites and icebergs (listen to the podcast); Jenny Saville’s fleshy bodies (listen to the podcast); Gabrielle Goliath’s moving video installation of women united by song; and Flora Yuhkhnovich’s embryonic sac-like paintings at Victoria Miro (listen to the podcast).

Plus, so many artists in Koyo Kouoh’s central exhibition, In Minor Keys. My favourites included:

• Maria Magdalena Campos-Pons and Kamaal Malak

• Seyni Awa Camara

• Wangechi Mutu

• Thania Petersen

• Leonilda González

• Sabian Baumann

• Wardha Shabbir

We also released a special GWA Podcast with Lubaina Himid, whose presentation for the British pavilion stages large-scale paintings – of architects, tailors, sailors, and cooks – drenched in her vibrant palette. The installation is accompanied by a soundscape, and asks questions about power, belonging, and migration.

When I asked her how she wanted her visitors to feel, she replied:

I think I want people to feel as if they’ve stepped inside something […] that reminds them of something they already know. Brings back memories, gets them to think about something they might do in the future, or a plan they had that they didn’t do, or wonder why they didn’t do it, whether they still could do it.

And I suppose I made these paintings for myself as well. I made them to try to understand who I am. So I guess they’re about that too.

Listen here!

Holy See Pavilion – The Ear is the Eye of the Soul, Giardini Mystica

My Venice highlight: the stunning Vatican pavilion tucked up in the northern-most point of Venice, in the "Giardini Mystica" (Mystical Garden). Featuring artists Patti Smith, Brian Eno, FKA Twigs, Precious Okoyomon and more, this sound installation guides you from one end of the garden to another. It is inspired by the great 12th century abbess, nun, Saint, artist and composer, Hildegard of Bingen, who composed over 77 unusual and innovative liturgical songs.

Austrian Pavilion – Florentina Holzinger: Seaworld Venice, Giardini

Italian Pavilion – Chiara Camoni: Con te con tutto (with you with everything), Arsenale

Spanish Pavilion – Oriol Vilanova: Los Restos, Giardini

Brazilian Pavilion – Rosana Paulino and Adriana Varejão: Comigo ninguém pode, Giardini

Listen to Adriana Varejão on the GWA Podcast!

Gabrielle Goliath: Elegy, Chiesa di Sant’Antonin

British Pavilion – Lubaina Himid: Predicting History, Testing Translation, Giardini

Listen here to the GWA Podcast Venice special with Lubaina Himid – and scroll on for some of my favourite moments from our conversation!

On architecture:

I’m pretty obsessed with architecture, with how things are made, who designed them, who built them, what the possibilities are within a space, how you can adapt them to do different things that you need them to do. And how power manifests itself; who has the most power in a showing space always interests me.

On how she approached the commission:

I tried really hard, probably right up until this week, not to take on the pressure of the occasion and to think of it like I always try to think of things: as a fab opportunity to make new work, and another location to take apart and put back together.

On belonging:

Every time I make work, I’m trying to answer the same question. Which is, how to deal with not being in the place where you, on paper, belong… So you’re taken from one place that is your home, your family, your food, your music, and you are placed somewhere else where you are supposed to be welcome. But everything that you were seems to have gone. So you have to dig very deep inside yourself to either make a huge change in your life to understand the new place, despite the fact that it probably doesn’t want you. But I’m kind of saying, do you think you have to? And how much do you hang on to the old place, just in case you can go back one day?

On painting questions:

Those sorts of dilemmas, being somewhere else in a new place and trying to understand yourself in relation to the old place and to the new place, happen across centuries, across everything that is human.

How do you balance that and still retain yourself within that? I’ve got no idea what the answer is, but I’m trying to paint the answer. And then of course, you know, when you paint the answer to something, you’re simply painting more questions. I’m looking for that too, that people will ask the questions of their own families, their own lives, their own dreams even, of how they want to be in this world.

On theatricality:

I’m excited and interested in making work that has a theatricality about it because I want the visitors to all my shows to be both performers and audience. You perform in that pavilion, in that you are asking yourself constantly, “is that me in that painting?” Or, “if I was to climb into this painting, could I join in the conversation?” Audiences have the ability to climb inside the painting.

Remember who you are:

I want to say you’re stronger and can deal with things more easily, whatever happens, if you know who you are. Which is why many times regimes try to take away, from the people they despise, a sense of who they are. It’s a long-lasting weapon to have your identity removed.

So if you have gone around this space and it reminds you even a tiny bit of who you are and what you like and who you love and where you find your sense of self – whether thats growing something small or cooking something for a couple of people or making something out of nothing or choosing clothes – then hang onto it and build it and grow it.

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The Venice Biennale is a major international art event held every two years. Regarded as the most important space to showcase art and artists, it revolves around a central exhibition – located at the Giardini and Arsenale. Alongside the central exhibition are national pavilions – think of it like the Olympics of art – whereby countries present shows by nominated artists. Plus, off-site collateral events and exhibitions.

Next week I’ll be sending out a round-up live from Venice. But for now, I’ve collated some of the artists and exhibitions I’m excited to see.

This article is divided into 3 parts: (1) Central Exhibition at the Giardini and Arsenale; (2) Pavilions; (3) Off-site shows. Enjoy!

1. Central Exhibition at the Giardini and Arsenale

Just some of the artists I am looking forward to seeing…

1. Ranti Bam (b.1982)

2. Alvaro Barrington (b.1983)

3. Beverly Buchanan (1940–2015)

4. Leonilda González (1923–2017)

5. Manuel Mathieu (b.1986)

6. Wangechi Mutu (b.1972)

7. Otobong Nkanga (b.1974)

8. Gala Porras-Kim (b.1984)

9. Mmakgabo Mmapula Helen Sebidi (b.1943)

10. Vera Tamari (b.1944)

11. Billie Zangewa (b.1973)

12. arms ache avid aeon: Nancy Brooks Brody (1962–2023), Joy Episalla (b.1957), Zoe Leonard (b.1961), Carrie Yamaoka (b.1957) and Jo-ey Tang (b.1978)

13. Rachel Fallon (b. 1971) & Alice Maher (b.1956)

14. Laurie Anderson (b.1947)

15. Marcia Kure (b.1970)

16. Georgina Maxim (b.1980)

17. Kaloki Nyamai (b.1985)

18. Kambui Olujimi (b.1976)

19. Rose Salane (b.1992)

20. Cauleen Smith (b.1967)

2. Pavilions

Estonia: Merike Estna, “The House of Leaking Sky”

The practice of painter Merike Estna (b.1980) goes beyond the canvas, foregrounding process and lived experience. In Venice she will transform a former church into an open, living studio, as she creates paintings from scratch, so that visitors can witness art coming into being.

Great Britain: Lubaina Himid, “Predicting History: Testing Translation”

The extraordinary Lubaina Himid (b.1954) has dedicated her thirty-year-plus career to uncovering silenced histories. Here she will show a series of paintings set in surreal, magical worlds, that explore ‘navigating life in places outside one's roots’.

Listen to Lubaina Himid on the GWA Podcast

Peru: Sara Flores, “From Other Worlds”

Sara Flores (b. 1950), from the Shipibo-Conibo community, creates intricate works rooted in the ancestral kené visual language – patterns that map relationships between nature, spirituality, and knowledge. In Peru’s first-ever presentation of an Indigenous artist, she will create an immersive environment foregrounding Indigenous cosmology.

Kosovo: Brilant Milazimi, “Hard Teeth (Dhëmbë të Fortë)”

Milazimi (b.1994) makes paintings that are both sinister and funny, tender and disturbing. His Biennale presentation takes the form of an immersive painting installation that will centre on themes of endurance and trauma, reflecting on the thin line between fragility and strength.

Morocco: Amina Agueznay, “Asǝṭṭa”

Amina Agueznay (b. 1963) is a multimedia artist who works with rural artisans to incorporate Moroccan cultural heritage into her varied practice. In Morocco’s first ever official pavilion at the Venice Biennale, she will present a monumental installation exploring thresholds, ancestral narratives, and artisanal practice.

Bahamas: John Beadle; Lavar Munroe, “In Another Man’s Yard: John Beadle, Lavar Munroe, and the Spirit of (Posthumous) Collaboration”

The Bahamas Pavilion will take the form of a collaboration between John Beadle (1964–2024) and Lavar Monroe (b.1982), two artists whose work is grounded in the island’s social and spiritual traditions, especially the processional festival Junkaroo.

Austria: Florentina Holzinger, “Seaworld Venice”

Austrian choreographer Holzinger (b.1986) makes work that is experimental, daring, theatrical and provocative – and I’m sure her Biennale presentation will be no different. For the pavilion she will expand her research on water within the Venetian context, probing the interplay of nature and technology.

Holy See: Soundwalk Collective, “The Ear is the Eye of the Soul”

24 artists – including FKA Twigs, Patti Smith and Brian Eno – have been selected by the Vatican for this ‘sound prayer’ to honour the the life and legacy of the Benedictine nun, Saint Hildegard of Bingen. Curated by Hans Ulrich Obrist and Ben Vickers.

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Levy’s new book, My Year in Paris with Gertrude Stein, follows a narrator who has travelled to Paris to find out more about Stein, a woman who bolted through the 19th to the 20th century and paved the way for modernism – known for her experimental writing and early championing of artists such as Picasso, Cézanne, and Matisse.

Born in 1874, Stein was in the youngest daughter of German-Jewish immigrant parents (who sadly died when she was a teenager). She went on to study psychology; then it was to medical school. In 1903, aged 29, she settled in Paris and began collecting art. The rest is history.

Her are some of my favourite insights from the episode… Enjoy Xoxo

“I think that my book gives Gertrude Stein a body. Because she’s so disembodied in the way that she is written. It is almost as if she’s not allowed to have a body, that she’s sort of rather mythic or cartoon-like. So I return the body to Gertrude Stein.”

On killing the 19th century:

Levy: Gertrude Stein is an avant-garde sister and she made something entirely new. She wanted to kill the 19th century. She was born in 1874. She was never going to fit into any Victorian idea of femininity and she didn't want to. So the first thing she had to lose was her corset, and her shame.

Her pioneering spirit:

One of the questions in my book is, what do words mean? And that’s actually Gertrude Stein’s project too. What do words mean?

I have a great admiration for her pioneering spirit, for her experiments. I love it that she came from science, psychology and cubism. And from those things she put together her writing behaviour, if you like.

Guided by pleasure:

I was aware of her as a figure because if you are a female writer, there were such despairing role models. They all committed suicide – it was Sylvia Plath, and Virginia Woolf, but Gertrude Stein lived a life guided by pleasure. Pleasure was her guiding principle. And actually that’s quite subversive, I think, for a female artist. We are all supposed to suffer and endure and all the rest of it. But she really enjoyed life.

Picasso’s portrait:

Katy: My route to Stein was the Picasso portrait. There’s countless images of her taken beneath it. She would always place herself in a chair in front of it! And as you quote her in the book, she wrote in 1938, “it is I, and it is the only reproduction of me, which is always I, for me.”

The painting became central to her identity, but – in a way – was someone else’s interpretation of her. Can you talk about painting and seeing oneself through the eyes of someone else, and accepting an image of yourself through the eyes of someone else?

Deborah: She sat for Picasso about 80 times. She’s very regal in that painting, she’s in those brown velvet robes… She’s a thinking subject in that portrait. And that’s because she was thinking all the time when she was sitting for it. She was writing Three Lives, one of her early books of connecting short stories.

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Alyce has just published Dorothea Tanning: A Surrealist World, which charts Tanning’s life story across the places she lived in, from America to France, as well as the worlds she imagined and travelled to in her art.

Alyce also had so many great insights on the work of this enigmatic and fascinating artist. Read on to hear all about five paintings by Tanning:

Eine Kleine Nachtmusik (1943)

Standing in a red-carpeted corridor are two girls with flame-like hair and ripped dresses. A giant sunflower appears to be chasing them. Three of the numbered doors behind them are shut, but there is one slightly ajar door on the right, with light spilling through…

Alyce: You’ve got the raw ingredients of something that could be lovely, pastoral, sweet, innocent. But Tanning takes those and turns them into something uncommon. And that’s quite a brave leap for an artist. But it's also one which relies on the audience, because the artist is sowing seeds for a story and you have to finish it. You have to jump into that world.

Is there a nod to Alice in Wonderland?

Alyce: Exactly. A little seven year old, curious, asking questions, who takes a blind leap after that rabbit down the hole and thinks this is fantastic! In Eine Kleine Nachtmusik, it’s Alice in Wonderland gone feral. An Alice who stays in the wonderland…

What about the giant sunflower?

Alyce: You've also got this blazing sunflower and it's whether that's a kind of a fiery, threatening flame, or one which is luring them into escape, into freedom.

When I went through correspondence and archives, she [Tanning] talked about the sunflower being the most aggressive of flowers. But in her notes she also noted that it was the one flower that could survive the desert heat in Sedona. So it’s actually a very strong flower to co-join with young girls, and suggests their potential, and that they’re wreaking havoc on the domestic space, I think.

Birthday (1942)

Katy: Birthday is the painting I always look at on January the 1st, because it has this incredible sense of possibility. She talked about this idea that ‘we must leave the door open to the imagination’ and there’s all these ajar doors, running for what looks like miles, and she’s clutching one of the doorknobs as if she’s opening it…

Alyce: The bare breasted Amazonian idea of her standing there plays with the idea that you might expect the woman to be the muse, to be passive, but her feet are rooted on the ground, and the gesture is important: her hand is on the doorknob…

What do the open doors mean?

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But what stood out for me most was not only how involved with, and influenced by, the surrealists she was – but how much she influenced and collaborated with them.

From providing inspiration for Meret Oppenheim’s fur-lined teacup, Salvador Dalí’s flower-headed women, to working with Eileen Agar on hats, Jean Cocteau on jackets, and Alberto Giacometti on interiors – Schiaparelli also gave many their first big break. As Sonnet told me:

Schiaparelli was a mentor to creatives and provided a space and money for them and their practices that brought them a greater prominence. […] She used the word ‘exhilarating’ when describing her collaborations with artists and that sense of excitement around the creative impulse is a through line in her entire career.

Let’s dive in!

Meret Oppenheim

Meret Oppenheim’s fur-lined tea cup (Object, 1936) is one of the defining works of the surrealist movement. But did you know that the idea began when Oppenheim was designing jewellery for Schiaparelli?

Sonnet: We know that Oppenheim, like a number of other creatives, made suggestions for jewellery and other items to be sold in Schiaparelli’s ground floor boutique at 21 Place Vendôme. The story that Oppenheim tells is that to earn some money, she designed some things for haute couture. One of them was this metal bracelet covered in fur, which was the predecessor essentially for the fur teacup. And so it’s a wonderful example of the ways in which Schiaparelli was a kind of mentor … and provided a space for them and a bit of money for their practices.

Click to listen to Oppenheim’s niece, Lisa, discuss her on the GWA Podcast.

Leonor Fini

Schiaparelli also collaborated with her friend Leonor Fini, the great painter known for her proto-punk images of women – and for dressing up in fantastical headdresses! They were also influenced by another iconic woman:

Sonnet: Fini and Schiaparelli designed a perfume bottle together called “Shocking” – aptly titled after one of her favourite words. The perfume bottle design was remarkable – it had never been done before. It was based on the dress form of the actress Mae West. It’s fascinating to me that Mae West – who was a very prominent client, Schiaparelli designed clothes for stage and screen for her – was very present here. She was the basis for the curvaceous female figure of the bottle design.

There’s an apocryphal story where the creative director at the house didn’t like the plainness of the figure, so added flowers, which I think Fini was not very happy about. The design also features a measuring tape around the shoulders, a reference to the inside workings of a couture atelier. And that’s a motif that the house today has taken up as very central to their codes of the house.

Listen to Alyce Mahon discuss Leonor Fini on the GWA Podcast.

Jean Cocteau

Jean Cocteau and Schiaparelli were great friends and collaborators. Cocteau felt that Schiaparelli – who he described as having the “air of a young demon” – and her fashion house provided a crucial centre for creative minds.

One of Cocteau and Schiaparelli’s most fantastical creations is this 1937 evening coat, the imagery of which can be read in two different ways…

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Perfect for anyone aged 8+, this free trail – which you can find in their entrance box (pictured above!) – takes you all over the gallery, from seeking out a portrait of Vanessa Bell or stained glass window of Pauline Boty, to Tracey Emin’s bronze portraits that adorn the front doors.

It also includes lots of fun activities that we call ‘Art Tasks’ to get kids thinking about how these artworks can apply to their own lives, sparking their creativity!

It’s totally free, and available from the Family Art Cart in the Ross Place entrance.

The trail has been tried and tested by kids already, watch here:

Enjoy! Love Katy Xoxo

Get your copy of The Story of Art Without Men: An Illustrated Guide to Amazing Women Artists!

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Last week I spent a few days in NYC and DC, and wow is there so much good art to see. Here’s a roundup of the shows, organised geographically. Happy art trailing. Xoxo

New York City

Uptown:

The Met: Raphael: Sublime Poetry

The Met: Helene Schjerfbeck: Seeing Silence (listen to the podcast!)

Don’t forget to take my audioguide: The Met Without Men!

Studio Museum in Harlem: Highlights from their collection

Guggenheim: Carol Bove

Lévy Gorvy Dayan: The Adventure of Domenico Gnoli

Midtown:

MoMA: Frida and Diego: The Last Dream

Read more

Missed out on a family-friendly event in London? I’ll be at the Royal Academy of Arts on Friday 29 May. Get your tickets here!

But here, in town, I am super excited to see the newly refurbished Studio Museum in Harlem; Raphael & Helene Schjerfbeck at The Met; Carol Bove at Guggenheim, before heading to Miami and Palm Beach to speak at the Norton Museum of Art. Those in town – come along! Details below.

Series 15 of The Great Women Artists Podcast is underway with episodes on Pina Bausch, Michaelina Wautier, Anni Albers, and more. Stay tuned for an Easter special this Friday for a deep-dive into one of the most enigmatic subjects in art history.

Okay. Let’s get going!

US Events

• Tuesday April 7, 6:30pm - I’ll be at Miami Design District giving a talk all about my book How to Live an Artful Life, and signing books! Tickets here.

• Friday April 10, 6pm - I’m excited to be giving this year’s Edlavitch Lecture at the Norton Museum of Art. Tickets here.

Kids’ trail at the NPG!

Looking to take a kid on a fun adventure around a gallery? Pick up my new trail at London’s National Portrait Gallery, which will take you on a treasure hunt around the galleries – encourages sketching, and includes crosswords and games. All free!

A coffee (or juice) at the RA

On Friday 29 May, 11am, I’ll be hosting a family-friendly event at the Royal Academy – featuring an interactive talk about amazing women artists (sketching materials provided for younger visitors to draw and respond during the talk). Tickets.

Why Art History Matters

I wrote a guest blog for Art History Link Up, an incredible charity who provide free art history courses for young people. Read that here.

The GWA Podcast: Meryl Tankard on Pina Bausch

In this week’s GWA episode, I met with dancer & choreographer Meryl Tankard to discuss her friend, the legendary dancer Pina Bausch (1940-2009). Listen here.

The GWA Podcast: Katlijne Van der Stighelen and Julien Domercq on Michaelina Wautier

Hear all about Michaelina Wautier (c.1604–1689), an artist totally unknown until her work was found in a museum basement 30 years ago, and whose exhibition is now open at the Royal Academy. Listen here.

The GWA Podcast: Dita Amory on Helene Schjerfbeck

I spoke with Dita Amory, curator of Seeing Silence: The Paintings of Helene Schjerfbeck at the Met – the first exhibition to showcase the work of the artist in a major US museum. On now, until April 5. Listen here.

The GWA Podcast: Nicholas Fox Weber on Anni Albers

Listen to art historian Nicolas Fox Weber speak about his good friend, the trailblazing textile artist Anni Albers (1899–1994), known for her spellbinding weavings that span large-scale wall-coverings to smaller thread-based works with electric colouring. Listen.

Cass Art Prize 2026: Entry is open

I’m excited to be a judge for the Cass Art Prize 2026, offered to artists across the UK and the Republic of Ireland. A £10,000 cash prize will be awarded to the overall winner, and shortlisted artists will be part of a group exhibition in London.

Submissions are open now until 12 May — enter here!

Plus a Book Signing at Cass Art Hampstead:

Sunday 19th April 2026, 11am – I’ll be at Cass Art Hampstead signing copies of the kid’s book! Come along.

Winchester Books Festival: Saturday 18 April

I’ll be at Winchester Books Festival on 18 April, for an interactive conversation with BBC Radio presenter Fee Mak all about the kids book. Tickets here!

A brief interlude for a shout-out to The Fence…

London is a great city, but it is enormous and even lifelong residents can find new things around every next corner. So how do you get the most out of this wonderful metropolis? Enter The Fence’s newest offering – Capital Letter, a guide to how to live in London right now.

You’ll get weekly insights into the best food, drinks, films, plays, exhibitions, shops and sights on offer in writing that’s funny and insightful. Along with all our best recommendations, you’ll get insider’s guides, humorous dispatches and unique slices of London history.

Ok! Now for this month’s recommendations…Enjoy! Xoxo Katy

12 shows to see in the UK:

• Michaelina Wautier, Royal Academy, London (until 21 Jun)

• Cecily Brown: Picture Making, Serpentine Gallery, London (until 6 Sep)

• Poppy Jones: Frozen Sun, Towner, Eastbourne (until 31 May)

• Leonora Carrington: The Symptomatic Surreal, Freud Museum, London (until 28 Jun)

• Paula Rego: Story Line, Victoria Miro, London (until 23 May)

• Schiaparelli: Fashion Becomes Art, V&A, London (until 1 Nov)

• Michaela Yearwood-Dan, The Whitworth, Manchester (until 18 Oct)

• Cultural diplomacy: The Wallace Collection at War, The Wallace Collection, London (until 25 Oct)

• Senga Nengudi: Performance Works 1972–1982, Whitechapel Gallery, London (until 14 Jun)

• In Bloom: How Plants Changed Our World, Ashmolean Museum, Oxford (until 25 Oct)

• Rachel Whiteread: Substitute, Gagosian, London (until 16 May)

• V&A East opens 18 April!

13 shows to see outside of the UK:

• Unforgettable: Women Artists from Antwerp to Amsterdam, 1600-1750, Museum of Fine Arts Ghent (until 31 May)

• Fisherwoman, Fisherwoman: Camille Souter & Alberta Whittle, IMMA, Dublin (until 13 Sep)

• Anna Maria Maiolino: Poetic Earth, MAAT, Lisbon

• Maria Lassnig and Edvard Munch: Flow of Paint = Flow of Life, Hamburger Kunsthalle, Hamburg (until 30 Aug)

• Ellen Gallagher: Fast-Fish and Loose-Fish, Gagosian, Paris (until 23 May)

• From Louise Bourgeois to Yoko Ono: Jewellery by female artists, Museum of Applied Arts, Cologne (until 26 Apr)

• Nicole Eisenman: Fallen Angels, Hauser & Wirth, Hong Kong (until 30 May)

• Julie Mehretu: KAIROS/Hauntological Variations, Museum of Modern Art Warsaw (until 30 Aug)

• Leonora Carrington, Musee Luxembourg, Paris (until 19 Jul)

• The Biennale of Sydney (until Jun 14)

• Lee Miller, Musée d’Art Moderne de Paris (until 2 Aug)

• Elizabeth Peyton: mountains in my heart (the death of Sarpedon), David Zwirner, New York (until 2 May)

• Metamorphoses at Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam (until 25 May)

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9 things to read:

• Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë - new edition published by Eiderdown Books, with illustrations by Edna Clarke Hall

• Rachel Whiteread: “Now I’m 62 and I can do what the fuck I want”, via Plaster Magazine

• My Year in Paris with Gertrude Stein by Deborah Levy

• Great artists and the side-hustles they did to get by, via The Guardian

• London Falling by Patrick Radden Keefe

• “Pleasure when eaten, ennui when ignored”: on the cakes of ‘Marie Antoinette’ (2006), via A Rabbit’s Foot

• Dorothea Tanning: A Surrealist World by Alyce Mahon

• Don’t Forget We’re Here Forever by Lamorna Ash (paperback out now!)

• Self-Help from the Middle Ages by Peter Jones

5 things to listen to/watch:

• Jessie Buckley via Desert Island Discs

• Anna Jameson Lecture 2026 by Marina Warner

• Caroline Walker: Women’s Work via BBC

• Sophie Calle via Louisiana Channel

• Rosamund Pike via How to Fail

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5 things to do in London:

• Dance: Kontakthof – Echoes of ‘78, Sadler’s Wells, 7—11 April

• Talk: Baldwin: A Love Story: Nicholas Boggs in Conversation with Mendez, Foyles Bookshop, 22 Apr, 7pm

• Theatre: A Doll’s House at the Almeida (until 23 May)

• Lates: Friday Lates life drawing at The National Gallery, 24 Apr

• Talk: Andrew Durbin and Deborah Levy in conversation, Tate Modern, 30 Apr, 7pm

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5 artists to know

Carole Gibbons (b.1935)

Huma Bhabha (b.1962)

Dani Trew (b.1991)

Laure Garcin (1896–1978)

Beverly Buchanan (1940-2015)

A writer, lecturer, author of almost 40 books, and former president of the Royal Society of Literature, Marina Warner – according to the New Yorker, is an authority on things that “don’t actually exist” – from magic spells to monstrous beasts.

A world specialist on myths, fairy tales and ancient stories, Warner has written indefatigably for the last five decades on how these tales – some thousands of years old – still speak to our culture today.

It will be fifty years since Warner published Alone of All Her Sex: the Myth and the Cult of the Virgin Mary (1976) and she will revisit the representation of the Madonna in her National Gallery lecture. It’s going to be good.

To get in the mood, let’s look back at some highlights from Warner’s episodes on the GWA podcast. First in 2022 speaking about Kiki Smith and Helen Chadwick, and again in 2023, on Eve, Lilith, Athena, and Medusa.

Enjoy! Xoxo Katy

On waking up to a new narrative:

“We are living in a narrative without us knowing it. And the point is, we need to wake up to what narrative it is we are in and how we want to continue it. Do we want to stay with it? Or do we want to challenge it?”

On the power of artists to change the story:

“I think we can leverage stories to work for us. And really, that’s what artists are doing — visual artists, literary artists, musicians… They are looking at the material that we carry with us. And they are giving it another inflection.”

On Eve:

"Eve was seen as the gateway of the devil, the dreadful, wicked woman who had betrayed Adam by giving him the apple to eat. People thought, Adam is an upstanding fellow, and its this unruly woman, typical of all womankind, who behaved like this and perverted him, and lost us salvation. Well, gradually, that has changed. A lot of poems and paintings have seen Eve as the actual gateway of knowledge. She’s the one who doesn’t acquiesce to this idea that there’s a ban on them knowing the difference between good and evil, or there’s a ban on them enjoying eternal life. She’s the spirit, if you like, of the Enlightenment, she’s the spirit of rebellion and desire and freedom.”

On Medusa’s origins:

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All of these quotes, and notes, stem from my book How To Live An Artful Life – the perfect gift for any mother, or the mothering figure in your life!

A mother’s interpretation of art

When filmmaker Nick Willing was young, he asked his mother, the painter Paula Rego, what an artist is, and she had this to say:

‘An artist is someone who goes to a place where no one’s been before, and brings back something we/you have never seen before but instantly recognise.’

Life advice from a mother

Loretta Pettway Bennett of the Gee’s Bend Quiltmakers told me:

‘My mother used to say: “Take what you have to make what you need.” In essence, you don’t have to buy pieces, you can use what you have. Instead of going out there trying to get what other people have and what other people do – do you! You know that you can’t go wrong doing you.’

Life advice from a grandmother

How can we appreciate each day we have? Mounira Al Solh once said:

‘When I was a teenager growing up in Beirut, I was always rushing around, staying so busy, trying to accomplish everything all at once. Time seemed to move so quickly. One day, I went to visit my grandmother, who was bedridden at that point. I must have been a bit frantic, because she said, “Mounira, relax, a day is as long as a year.” That phrase really stayed with me. I had never before considered how different that time must feel to this wise, elderly woman.’

For a further discussion on grandmothers, click here to read my interview with Katherine Bradford in The Brooklyn Rail.

Ishiuchi Miyako on the absence of mothers

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I’m so excited to say that my new book, The Story of Art Without Men: An illustrated guide to amazing women artists, is out now!

It’s an adaptation of The Story of Art without Men for readers aged 8–14 (and above), brought to life with beautiful illustrations by Ping Zhu and artworks from the past 500 years.

I’m thrilled to say that The Bookseller has listed it among their top titles for March, Waterstones has called it one of their Children’s Books You Need to Read in 2026, and BookKind have made it their Children’s Book of the Month.

Get your copy: Signed and personalised copies; Signed copies; Indie bookshop; Audiobook; Ebook.

Celebrate the launch! Book Signing at Tate Modern

This Sunday 8 March (International Women’s Day!), I will be hosting three tours at Tate Modern. They’ve just sold out, but you are welcome to join us for a public book signing (open to all) between 2.15–3.15pm, at Tate’s Terrace Bookshop.

A preview of the audiobook

To celebrate, here’s an audio sneak peek of the introduction — including my ‘art historian’s toolbox’:

GWA Podcast: Katherine Rundell — World Book Day Special

Who better to have on the GWA Podcast on World Book Day than the woman literally saving reading for children right now: Katherine Rundell.

Here are two of many brilliant things she said:

“The thing that makes me very sad is that a lot of children don’t have access to exquisite images. They have access to the internet and AI slop. But because we don’t teach art history in primary schools, we don’t have the idea that it’s normal that children would be offered beauty, and I would love them to be flooded with it, to be flooded with choice… The thing that we need to give children is this sense that there are a million forms of art, and that there are a million ways of creating. Because if you can give them that sense of sweep and scope, they will find something to love.”

–

“If we can show a ten year old a Barbara Hepworth, that ten year old – even if it doesn’t at the moment strike them to the heart – has something new about the world. They have seen that the world is full of this particular burning imagination, that was Barbara Hepworth’s. So, for that reason, I think that we neglect art for children at our peril, because we are depriving them of such fire and such joy…

If anyone is listening to this and they have a child, one of the best things you can do for them is take them to a gallery and give them time to find the thing they love in it. Because that sort of treasure hunt, when you’re taken to a gallery not to behave yourself, but to find one thing to adore – and then you’re allowed cake! – that is a great day out.”

Listen here!

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We’ve started our primary school tour of the UK. My new book for younger readers is out this Thursday. Get your copy here!

Are you a teacher/ want your child to join in the virtual lesson this Friday, at 10am? Sign up here.

We’ve added another tour at the Tate Modern for this Sunday, 12pm! Tickets here.

To mark World Book Day, and publication week, we’ve also got a very exciting GWA Podcast in store for you, with the brilliant Katherine Rundell. Listen here!

Ok. Let’s dive in. Katy Xoxo

JUST ADDED: A new tour at Tate Modern (for ages 8+)

On International Women’s Day (Sunday 8 March), I will be hosting three tours at Tate Modern! Two sold out, so we’ve added a third.

• 12pm

• 1.15pm – sold out

• 3.30pm – sold out

Get your tickets. Suitable for ages 8 and above!

Join us for a public book signing (open to all) between 2.15–3.15pm.

The Great Women Artists Podcast: Tracey Emin

Who better to kick off the new season of The Great Women Artists Podcast than with the Dame herself: Tracey Emin. We met on the occasion of her new Tate exhibition, “A Second Life” – which she has said will be a “true celebration of living” – and discussed new beginnings, Margate, dancing, spiritualism, and much more.

“Everything we make and everything we do in art is saying something. It’s not just like the legacy of the artists, it’s like the legacy of mankind. It’s like the ancient Egyptians or you know, everything from Stonehenge to the Orkney Isles, to all the beautiful monuments that are left. It’s for mankind to remember that there was a beautiful world, and that’s where we live. And right now there’s a lot of people that are just hellbent on destroying it. So that’s why art is more important than ever. It’s a serious thing.”

Listen.

The Guardian: Artemisia Gentileschi’s Mary Magdalene

For The Guardian I wrote about the sublime Mary Magdalene in Ecstasy by Artemisia Gentileschi (recently acquired by the National Gallery of Art in DC) and what happens when we see female figures depicted through a woman’s eyes.

The woman we are looking at is Mary Magdalene “in ecstasy”, painted in the early 1620s by Artemisia Gentileschi, the Italian baroque artist famed for her heroic and powerful depictions of mythological and biblical women. Recently acquired by the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC, it will go on view – free of charge – from 24 February. While it is, monumentally, the institution’s first acquisition by Gentileschi, it is also a picture that shows the saint “neither repentant nor suffering”, as curator Letizia Treves has written. An important distinction because, for centuries, Magdalene’s image has been shaped not just by scripture, but fabulated and conflated by powerful men.

Read here.

On Substack: Q&A: The Life of a Library Builder

The team at Hatchards Piccadilly are great friends of mine, and I recently learnt about a service they provide: ‘library building’ – after they assisted the making of Coco Chanel’s library in her south of France villa. I wanted to find out more, so I sat down with resident bookseller, Tom Baily, to chat all things books, Hatchards, and library building. Read here!

On Substack: The Art of Love

For Valentine’s Day, we looked at 4 ways artists can get us to think about love – from my book, How To Live An Artful Life. Dive in.

On Substack: GWA Recommends: Die My Love

I wrote about a film I really loved, Lynne Ramsay’s Die My Love, and gathered some artworks by female artists that I think speak to the film in interesting ways – ft. Leonora Carrington, Senga Nengudi, Cornelia Parker and more. Check it out!

And now for March’s recommendations. Xoxo Katy

12 things to see in the UK:

• Tracey Emin: A Second Life, Tate Modern, London (until 31 Aug)

• Joy Labinjo: A Place of Our Own, Wolverhampton Art Gallery (until 4 May)

• Rose Wylie: The Picture Comes First, Royal Academy, London (until 19 Apr)

• Beatriz Gonzalez, Barbican, London (until 10 May)

• Delaine Le Bas: Unfair Ground, The Whitworth, Manchester (until 31 May)

• Siobhan Liddell: Dusk, Hollybush Gardens, London (until 28 Mar)

• Relative Ties: Mabel Nicholson, Nancy Nicholson, EQ Nicholson and Louisa Creed, The Women’s Art Collection, Cambridge (until 6 Sep)

• Lord Arthur Savile’s Crime, Sadie Coles, London (until 21 Mar)

• Catherine Opie: To Be Seen, National Portrait Gallery, London (until 31 May)

• Beryl Cook: Pride and Joy, The Box, Plymouth (until 31 May)

• Sofia Coppola’s Photography Bookshelf, V&A South Kensington, London (until 22 Mar)

• Loie Hollowell: Overview Effect, Pace, London (until 23 May)

9 things to see outside the UK:

• London Calling, Kunstmuseum den Haag, The Hague (until 7 Jun)

• Grey! Art on Aging, museum van Bommel van Dam, Venlo (until 14 Jun)

• Yayoi Kusama, Museum Ludwig, Cologne (until 2 Aug)

• Ruth Asawa: Retrospective, Guggenheim Bilbao, (until 13 Sep)

• Metamorphoses, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam (until 25 May)

• Helen Levitt, Fundación Mapfre, Madrid (until 17 May)

• Eva Jospin / Claire Tabouret, Grand Palais, Paris (until 29 Mar)

• Graciela Iturbide: Eyes to Fly With, C/O Berlin (until 10 Jun)

• Maysha Mohamedi: Maysha the Fool, Pace Gallery, New York (until 25 Apr)

• Spectrum of Desire: Love, Sex, and Gender in the Middle Ages, The Met Museum, New York (until 29 March)

5 things to read:

• Artists, Siblings, Visionaries: The lives and loves of Gwen and Augustus John by Judith Mackrell

• Troublemaker: The Fierce, Unruly Life of Jessica Mitford by Carla Kaplan

• Clare Bucknell at the National Gallery, via LRB

• Catherine Opie and Judie Bamber in conversation, via Plaster Magazine

• Dora Maurer’s obituary, via The Guardian

5 things to listen to/watch:

• Keep the World Away: Finding Gwen John, BBC

• Catherine Opie via A Brush With…

• Tracey Emin on Woman’s Hour, via BBC Radio 4

• Debbie Harry via Fashion Neurosis with Bella Freud

• Georg Wilson via Talk Art

5 things to do in London:

• Catherine Opie in conversation, National Portrait Gallery, 6 Mar, 7pm

• Turn It Out with Tiler Peck & Friends, Sadlers Wells, 12–14 March

• Zakia Sewell in conversation with Emma Dabiri, Foyles, 19 Mar, 7pm

• The Female Body in Art, Tate Modern, 20 Mar, 6:30pm

• Tracey Emin in conversation with David Dawson, National Portrait Gallery, 27 Mar, 7pm

5 artists to know

Beatriz Gonzalez (1932–2026)

Nieves González (b.1996)

Joline Kwakkenbos (b.1997)

Anna Pakosz (b.1991)

Aurora Noreña (b.1962)