The Easel

17th February 2026

The Bedazzling, Wild Designs of Modernism’s Forgotten Genius

Michael Kimmelman | Breaking One | 4th February 2026

Architects are now supposed to be multi-disciplinary collaborators rather than isolated creatives. If true, that makes Goff thoroughly modern. Mid-century America saw him as a polymath and a visionary, yet he is now little remembered. What marked him out were his daring designs and use of everyday materials and objects. He designed a church in the oilfields, for example, with a roof structure made from surplus oil pipes. Said one critic “the most provocative manifestation of American architectural genius”.

Eugène Atget, Readymade Icon

Julia Curl | Hyperallergic | 30th January 2026

As Paris modernised, Atget had the idea of photographing the old cluttered parts of the city.  It turned into a 30-year project. He didn’t think of himself as an artist, describing his images merely as “documents”. They were utilitarian is style, notably views of buildings taken around dawn when the streets were empty. Somehow those quiet images felt unsettling. Few of his photographs were printed in his lifetime but Atget is now regarded as a “precursor of modern photography”.

“Gainsborough: The Fashion of Portraiture” Goes on View At The Frick Collection

Celia McGee | Galerie | 10th February 2026

When Gainsborough moved to Bath, his studio was next door to an upmarket health spa where he could observe the latest fashions. Those fashions can now be seen to have reflected important social changes. Britain’s wealth accumulation in the later 1700’s was immense, due to slavery, plantations, banking and factories. A new middle class wanted what the aristocracy had, including beautiful clothes and flattering Gainsborough portraits. It seems he tired of all the “upward striving”, calling it “the curs’d Face Business”.

10th February 2026

Henri Rousseau’s wild dreams

Michael Prodger | Engelsberg Ideas | 2nd January 2026

The strange case of Rousseau. He desperately wanted to be am. artist and managed to exhibit alongside professional artists. Yet his work was “clumsy and maladroit” with stilted figures, skewed perspective and “dogs out of scale”. His jungle paintings, though intended to be realistic, have a dreamlike quality and seem to contain a narrative. Those qualities appealed to the surrealists who promoted his work. Whether his shortcomings were deliberate or simply a lack of capability is still debated.

German Expressionist Gabriele Münter Finally Gets Her Moment in the Spotlight

Katie White | artnet news | 4th November 2025

Before the drama of her painting career, Münter tried photography while visiting the American south. Returning to her native Munich she began painting and was caught up in the tumult of modernism sweeping Europe. She and Kandinsky founded the legendary expressionist “Blue Rider” group. Her vibrant colors and simplified forms exemplified their belief in colour as a language of emotion. Once a leading inter-war artist, Münter has since been relegated to merely Kandinsky’s lover.

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