The Easel

16th December 2025

An Exhibition at the Met May Just Make Finnish Modernist Helene Schjerfbeck Your New Favorite Artist

Laird Borrelli-Persson | Vogue | 8th December 2025

From studying in Paris Schjerfbeck developed a realist style broadly consistent with emerging modernism. After returning home to Helsinki, this style started to change. Her interiors took on an “architectonic plainness”. A curator says her portraits focused on “light, space, volume—not the soul of the sitter”. Her self-portraits were without sentiment, “depicting her mortality with an almost Goya-like intensity”. Says one writer. The rarely exhibited Schjerfbeck “shaped modern portraiture from a distance”.

Jeff Koons with Joachim Pissarro

Joachim Pissarro | The Brooklyn Rail | 1st December 2025

Koons divides opinions, and his first New York show in years is no different. The linked piece describes a studio visit where Koons enthuses over 18th century porcelain figurine that have inspired him. Sounding a bit like a retailer, he highlights his personal involvement with his new works. One writer protests that these glossy works are “intentionally stealing from the past. Poor [Koons]. He has no idea that no one will be thinking about this forgettable show by this time next year”.

June Leaf: ‘Shooting From the Heart’: The Grey Art Museum Honors a Lifetime of Uncompromising Creation

Abigael Sidi | The Science Survey | 17th November 2025

Leaf had a long career but never enjoyed sustained acclaim. Perhaps she was overshadowed by her famous photographer husband. More simply, perhaps her art also was too difficult. In the 1950’s when abstraction was all the rage, she not only stuck with figuration but produced work in “every art medium imaginable”. One renowned painting left the writer “equally captivated and confused, sure of its brilliance but unsure of its message … constantly layering ideas on top of each other”.

9th December 2025

Five Ways of Looking at Wifredo Lam

Staff | MoMA Magazine | 18th November 2025

Lam’s work has long perplexed the art world. Born in Cuba, he moved to Spain in his early 20’s to study art. Eighteen years later he returned, wanting to blend cubism and surrealism with a Caribbean sensibility. La Jungla, his acknowledged masterpiece, does just that, placing figures amidst sugar cane and jungle foliage. Lam said the work was “an act of decolonisation … in a mental sense”. He gave “a mystical presence to [everyday] scenes”. Says a curator “There’s so much that remains to be [understood]”.

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