Arts news

• Even if you’re not a person of faith, there are reasons to see Antoni Gaudí as a saint | Rowan Moore

  19-04-2025 17:00 via theguardian.com
  
  The Catholic church has taken the first steps to canonise the architect of Barcelona’s extraordinary Sagrada FamíliaI don’t understand the processes by which people become saints, but the case for the canonisation of the great Catalan architect Antoni Gaudí, now progressing with the blessing of the pope, seems strong. He was devout – he tried to go without food for 40 days in emulation of Jesus Christ, until a bishop friend talked him out of likely death. The unpr
  
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• ‘Is there a place for the poor?’ Artists and activists try to revive Johannesburg, crumbling City of Gold

  19-04-2025 15:08 via theguardian.com
  
  Issues around basic services, corruption and class trouble vibrant Johannesburg, which this year hosts the G20 summitBethabile Mavis Manqele mops the veranda of the house she has lived in for most of the last 40 years. The ceiling above her is full of holes, blackened by years of cooking fires. Manqele, 64, isn’t sure how many people live in the house’s seven rooms. There are no utilities, the landlord is absent and she hasn’t paid rent in years, she says through a translator.
  
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• Why JMW Turner is still Britain’s best artist, 250 years on

  19-04-2025 12:55 via theguardian.com
  
  The revered artist conjured groundbreaking scenes of gods, legends and lost civilisations, but, more than anything, his work came to represent the complex soul of Britain like that of no artist before or sinceHe never crossed the Atlantic. Never sailed the Aegean. A cross-channel ferry was enough for Joseph Mallord William Turner to understand the might and majesty of the sea. His 1803 painting Calais Pier records his feelings on his first arrival in France as foaming green mountains of wav
  
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• ‘This trick is incredibly risky for him’: Ankit Ghosh’s best phone picture

  19-04-2025 11:00 via theguardian.com
  
  The Indian photographer captures his neighbour breathing fire at the finale of a major Hindu festivalIn a narrow lane in Kolkata, West Bengal, Ankit Ghosh paused for a moment to take this photo. Ghosh was among crowds attending Vijaya Dashami, the last day of the Durga Puja, a festival he describes as “cultural potpourri”. He says, “It’s celebrated all across India, but there is no other place to experience it better than West Bengal. As this
  
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• Tom Gauld’s Easter extract from Dan Brown’s new novel – cartoon

  19-04-2025 09:00 via theguardian.com
  
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• Peri-peri patron: how Nando’s amassed a huge collection of South African art

  19-04-2025 09:00 via theguardian.com
  
  Chicken chain has been buying up art since 2004, which it displays on walls of its restaurantsOn a weekday lunchtime the Nando’s restaurant in Maponya Mall in Soweto, the sprawling former Black township on Johannesburg’s outskirts, was busy with couples, white-collar workers and older women dining alone. Behind them, a vivid graffiti portrait of a young Black woman filled the wall.The mural, by the Cape Town artist Kilmany-Jo Liversage, is part of one of the largest private art colle
  
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• From Sinners to Étoile: a complete guide to this week’s entertainment

  19-04-2025 07:00 via theguardian.com
  
  Michael B Jordan faces down evil in a prohibition-era southern horror, and Charlotte Gainsbourg pliés into a fun new ballet comedy-dramaSinners
  Out nowMichael B Jordan plays twins, Smoke and Stack, who return home to Mississippi during the prohibition era with the aim of setting up a juke joint. Ryan Coogler’s supernatural horror also stars Hailee Steinfeld, Jack O’Connell and Wunmi Mosaku. Continue reading...
  
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