- Article
- Article
Performance art, frozen in time
For over a year, live performance art with an audience present has been largely impossible. But still images continue to allow artists in this sphere to inspire audiences at home.
- Article
- Article
The art of scientific glassblowing
Exciting things happen when art, craft, engineering and science collide. Glassblower Gayle Price is proof of that.
- Interview
- Interview
Inside the mind of Somewhere in Between’s curator, Laurie Britton Newell
The exhibition's curator shares her secrets.
- Interview
- Interview
Meet the climate emergency
Find out what led Yinka Shonibare to create the compelling artwork ‘Refugee Astronaut’.
- Article
- Article
How electromagnetic therapy inspired me
Poet Sarah James explores how repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation treated her depression and influenced her art.
- Article
- Article
“Life and the universe change our plans”
Artist Lil Sullivan returns to the printmaking workshop for the first time after her stroke, and uses broken and discarded everyday objects to create art.
- In pictures
- In pictures
Medicine Now... then
A look back at highlights from Medicine Now, an exhibition from 2007 where artists and audiences explored the connections between contemporary medicine, life and art.
- Article
- Article
A brief history of tattoos
The earliest evidence of tattoo art dates from 5000 BC, and the practice continues to hold meaning for many cultures around the world.
- Article
- Article
Synaesthesia, or when senses overlap
What’s it like to see heartbeats, taste Tube stations or hear paintings?
- Article
- Article
Chemotherapy-day drawings
Undergoing treatment for bowel cancer, artist Clare Smith produced around 70 abstract drawings while sitting in the chemotherapy chair. She reflects on how creativity can bring respite in a crisis.
- Article
- Article
Dazzling luxury
As the 20th century dawned, both elite and masses basked in the marvellous and unearthly glow of the new electric illumination.
- Article
- Article
The painter, the psychiatrist and a fashion for hysteria
A dramatic painting brings a famous event in medical history alive. But it also tells a tale about the health preoccupations of the time.
- Interview
- Interview
Inside the minds of Teeth’s two curators, James Peto and Emily Scott-Dearing
James Peto and Emily Scott-Dearing talk visceral reactions, their interactions and object extractions.
- Article
- Article
Paris Morgue and a public spectacle of death
Known as the “only free theatre in Paris”, La Morgue was a popular place for the public to view cadavers on display.
- Article
- Article
Louis Wain’s cryptic cats
Once famous for his quirky cat illustrations, today Louis Wain is often portrayed as a ‘psychotic’ artist whose illness can be mapped out through his drawings. Here Bryony Benge-Abbott takes a more rounded view.
- Article
- Article
Designing better mental health wards
Bringing colour and natural light to tired, grubby mental health wards has a measurably positive effect on patients. A few groundbreaking projects are showing the way.
- Interview
- Interview
Inside the mind of George Vasey, co-curator of Misbehaving Bodies
Discover how curator George Vasey honoured the approaches of Jo Spence and Oreet Ashery, who mischievously subvert clichés around illness and death.
- Article
- Article
An animated almanac for the modern world
Discover why Thomas Coleman wanted to make a medieval folding almanac relevant to the modern world and see the film for yourself.
- Article
- Article
John Walter on ‘Alien Sex Club’
I’m a painter, but I make worlds.
- Article
- Article
Maria McKinney on ‘Sire’
All my grandparents were farmers; I grew up in the countryside surrounded by farms and helped neighbours herd sheep and cattle into the field. My body of work called ‘Sire’ looks at the genomics of modern cattle breeding.
- Photo story
- Photo story
Beautiful bedding and how to die well
When you are unwell, your bed can be both a refuge and a prison. Discover how artist Poppy Nash created a bed-centred artwork inspired by her own chronic illness and depictions of ill health from history.
- Article
- Article
The extraordinary body of Evatima Tardo
Darling of 19th-century American freak shows, Evatima Tardo remained serene as she withstood crucifixion and the bites of poisonous snakes. But she took the secret behind her abilities to her grave.
- Article
- Article
Mapping the body
These intricate anatomical drawings show how Ayurveda practitioners have explored the human body and how it works.
- Article
- Article
The amateur silversmith
It started as hobby and soon became a passion. Geraldine Holden tells us where the art and science of silver unite.
- Article
- Article
Why the 1918 Spanish flu defied both memory and imagination
The Black Death, AIDS and Ebola outbreaks are part of our collective cultural memory, but the Spanish flu outbreak has not been.