March Diary: Where to go and what to see

Spring is just around the corner and the weather is slowly improving, so now is a good time to get out and about to blast away the winter blues. We’ve compiled a list of our picks of exhibitions and events opening around the world this month that we hope will inspire and entertain you.

Thomas Demand: L’image Volée
Fondazione Prada, Milan, 18 March – 28 August 

L’image Volée, or The Stolen Image, is a group show curated by Thomas Demand. The exhibition considers our reliance on pre-existing models and the borrowing or stealing of imagery which artists employ to make their work. Featuring Maurizio Cattelan, Sophie Calle and John Baldessari among many others, the exhibition presents multiple impressions of stealing – from the crime scene, through to appropriation and conceptual spying. 

Botticelli Reimagined
V&A, London, 5 March – 3 July 2016

An exhibition charting Botticelli’s influence across the arts, from his famous painting The Birth of Venus to the painting, prints and cinematic homages it has inspired. The show puts the Renaissance painter in a new cultural context and includes work by William Morris, David LaChapelle, Andy Warhol and Cindy Sherman, to name a few.

Robert Mapplethorpe: The Perfect Medium
Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), LA, March 20 – July 31 2016

This exhibition explores Mapplethorpe’s work through early drawings, collages, sculpture, Polaroids and other materials from his archive. Robert Mapplethorpe: The Perfect Medium highlights the artist’s relationship to New York’s underground, and lines up with a companion exhibition of his work at the J. Paul Getty Museum, as well as the new Mapplethorpe documentary Mapplethorpe: Look at the Pictures.

Laura Ford: Seen and Unseen
Abbot Hall Art Gallery, Kendall, Cumbria, 11 March – 25 June 2016
The Arts & Crafts House, Cumbria,11 March – 4 September 2016

Laura Ford describes her work as “sculptures dressed as people dressed as animals.” This new show will display her imaginative, often unsettling and slightly disturbing, creations across two locations in the Lake District. The exhibitions will show Ford’s earlier work together with new sculptures.

Jack Early
Fergus McCaffrey, New York, until 9 April

The artist that “put a severed finger in a Mountain Dew can,” Jack Early has a new show that looks at childhood. As such, it references asthma and vintage porn, as well as presenting his gigantic popsicle paintings. Looks like an absolute riot.

Edgar Degas: A Strange New Beauty
Museum of Modern Art, New York, 26 March – 24 July 2016

Eschewing the ballet paintings he’s known for, MoMA’s exhibition on Degas’ work focuses on his output as a printmaker and avid user of the monotype process. Displaying his interpretation of urban life, the show will include approximately 120 monotypes, with 50 related paintings, drawings and sketchbooks.

Strange and Familiar: Britain as Revealed by International Photographers
Barbican Centre, London, 16 March – 19 June 2016

Martin Parr curates this Barbican show which looks at how international photographers from the 1930s to today have captured the social, cultural and political identity of the UK through the camera lens. From Henri Cartier-Bresson to Robert Frank, the exhibition aims to present a colourful portrait of modern Britain.

Hilma af Klint: Painting the Unseen
Serpentine Gallery, London, 3 March – 15 May 

Now regarded as a pioneer of abstract art, Hilma af Klint’s work hadn’t been shown publicly until the 1980s. The Serpentine exhibition focuses on The Paintings for the Temple, a body of work that charts the influence of science and religion on af Klint’s work, including concepts of good and evil, the spiritual and material worlds. 

Matissology
Beach London, 24 March – 3 April

The good people of Belly Kids are hosting a show called Matissology, celebrating the launch of a book of the same name by Barcelona’s David Mendez Alonso. It’s all colour, abstract shapes and “emotional energy.” Lovely.