The Easel

3rd March 2026

Rose Wylie Memories Relived and Shared

Sue Hubbard | Artlyst | 26th February 2026

Wylie emerged, middle-aged, from motherhood full of ambition for her art. Now 91, she has built an international reputation with work that is an irreverent mish mash of the high and low brow. This includes a “splodgy red elephant, a blue frog and a yellow omelette”, all featuring bright colours and thick brushstrokes. It takes “dedication to paint this badly – if by badly one means creating images that are simplified to their essence”. Says one writer “a stunning, life-affirming exhibition”. Images are here

Tracey Emin’s A Second Life at the Tate Modern: beyond the YBA heyday, the artist sings anew

Dora Davies-Evitt | tatler | 26th February 2026

Emin has lived life to excess and then, well, “overshared”. This leads some critics to see weaknesses in a “vast” survey. One suggests, for example, that Emin’s sculptures are not great and her neons belong in hotel foyers. This writer disagrees. Emin takes “the thing [worth saying] and drags it into the public – sex, shame, trauma, abortion – made digestible through aesthetic force and relatability (that messy, unmade bed) … her art is attractive for its lack of euphemism and varnish.”

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