Jean-Etienne Liotard Exhibition at Royal Academy of Arts

The Royal Academy of Arts is showcasing an exhibition on the work of Jean-Etienne Liotard who was an artist in great demand across Enlightenment Europe and beyond.

An eccentric and distinctive portraitist, Liotard’s work conjures up the magnificence and cultural curiosity of the age in vividly lifelike detail. Born at the beginning of the 18th century, this idiosyncratic Swiss artist was one of the most accomplished portraitists of his day. He travelled widely – from London to the Orient – applying his unflinching powers of observation to create beautifully crafted portraits, the majority in his signature pastels on parchment.

At the peak of his powers, Liotard was commissioned to paint portraits of members of the British, French and Austrian royal families. A master of self-publicity, he was known as ‘the Turk’ – so-called for his adoption of Oriental costume following an extended voyage to the Near East, where he painted expatriate residents as well as scenes of everyday life in the Ottoman Empire. The Jean-Etienne Liotard Exhibition at the Royal Academy of Arts is on from 24 October 2015 to 31 January 2016.

Royal Academy - Jean-Etienne Liotard - Woman on Sofa

Jean-Etienne Liotard painting – Woman on a sofa reading. Photo: © Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence.

Tina Engstrom

The Victoria & Albert Museum established in 1857 by Queen Victoria and Prince Albert is the world’s largest museum of decorative arts and design and houses a permanent collection of over 4.5 million objects. This vast collection is stored and displayed in a number of buildings over 12 acres of land in the South Kensington area of London, with over a third of a mile in circumference. These objects along with a wide range of exhibitions make the Victoria & Albert Museum one of the more popular tourist attractions in London. Below we highlight six upcoming exhibitions at the Victoria & Albert Museum.

13 October 2015

Frank Auerbach Exhibition at Tate Britain

Tate Britain has launched an exhibition featuring Frank Auerbach (b 1931, Berlin), a British artist who has made some of the most vibrant, alive and inventive paintings of recent times. Often compared to Francis Bacon and Lucian Freud in terms of the revolutionary and powerful nature of his work, his depictions of people and the urban landscapes near his London studio show him to be one of the greatest painters alive today.