MARK TURNER is thrilled by the the British singer’s tribute to the late great Sarah Vaughan
Latest editorial
The expression of the economy in culture
The expression of the economy in culture
NICK WRIGHT delicately unpicks the eloquent writings on art of an intellectual pessimist who wears his Marxism lightly
RITA DI SANTO speaks to Laura Carreira about her study of workers in an Amazon warehouse, On Falling
MATTHEW HAWKINS appreciates an interpretation in dance of James Baldwin’s landmark novel of doomed homosexual desire
STEF LYONS is swept along by the infectious energy of an ex-con single mother’s dreams of Nashville
New releases from Jenn Butterworth, Liz Overs, and Gigspanner Big Band
SUSAN DARLINGTON applauds the translation of Jane Eyre into a ballet that preserves the drama of her formative years
Festival Coordinators TRISH MEEHAN and DODIE WEPPLER introduce some of the highlights of Screen Cuba Film Festival 2025
Those Passions: On art and politics
TJ Clark, Thames and Hudson, £40
1848 – the year of European revolutions, the year Marx and Engels wrote The Manifesto of the Communist Party – marked a deep change in the ways in which bourgeois society came to be ruled and in the immediate years that followed, and conditioned by the same processes, realist painting became a thing.
The French state became active as a patron of art in a more overtly ideological and politically significant way than authority and class power had in previous eras. The distinctive feature of this endeavour was, for the French state and, by extension for the French nation, the promotion of a particular understanding of the Revolution.
In TJ Clark’s first two books – The Absolute Bourgeois: Artists and Politics in France 1848-1857 and Image of the People. Gustave Courbet and the 1848 Revolution – a generation of art historians found that – in the collision of art and politics and the interplay of painting and state power – there came a real understanding of the relationship between the profound if barely perceptible movement of the economy and what was happening in people’s heads. And what appeared on the walls of state institutions.
More from this author
NICK WRIGHT examines how Farage’s party has attracted five distinct voter tribes with incompatible views on economics, immigration and state intervention — presenting both a challenge and opportunity for left organising
In the recent federal elections the far-right AfD was able to reach sections of the working class on issues over which the left is divided and unable to articulate a coherent position, a situation that is replicated in a number of other European countries, argues NICK WRIGHT
NICK WRIGHT examines the British ruling class's complex relationship with fascism before, during and after the second world war
With federal elections coming up in Germany in February, NICK WRIGHT takes a look at the class forces shaping the policies of the main parties, and sees little hope of a breakthrough for the left
Similar stories
CAROLINE FOWLER explains how the slave trade helped establish the ‘golden age’ of Dutch painting and where to find its hidden traces
MARJORIE MAYO recommends an exhibition that asserts Palestinian history, culture and creativity in the face of strategies to erase them
JAN WOOLF applauds art that has not only documented the anti-war and anti-capitalist movement but been an integral part of it
HENRY BELL steps warily through the collection of a Glaswegian war profiteer to experience his collection of Degas’ remarkable images of working people