Wednesday 05 August 2026
What’s happening in museums, galleries, art and heritage
Scroll for: Take Five Hundred ✍️ | Hot List 🔥
Happy Wednesday.
It’s mid-week, and it’s an opinion edition!
The Artists Information Company (a-n) is the largest artists’ membership organisation in the UK. Now, 46 years after it was founded, it’s got a new name: Artists Now.
Yet its mission to campaign at the highest levels for its 36,000 members — all of whom are artists — continues with new vigour, and it’s launched its new chapter by publishing a major ‘green manifesto’ to help artists navigate the climate emergency. In today’s Take Five Hundred guest column, Artists Now’s CEO Julie Lomax explains why it’s so timely.
And on the Hot List, see my pick of five cultural offerings you should be diving into this week — from a show of American urban photography, to an airport queue simulator at Tate Modern. Yes, really.
I’ll be back on Friday with your news digest.
maxwell
An opinion column — in 500 words — by a guest writer.
Julie Lomax | CEO of Artists Now
It’s summer 2026, and as I write, two words come to mind: London’s Burning.
They’re words that were immortalised both from a children’s nursery rhyme referencing the Great Fire of London in 1666, and in The Clash’s song of the same name, penned after the searing heatwave in 1976.
So, it’s not lost on me that we are launching our Green Manifesto for artists in the summer of 2026: another year ending in ‘6’, and a year when London is burning in 30C-plus temperatures, while the UK experiences water shortages and wildfires.
📺 WATCH | Half of England plunged into 'flash drought' — but what does it mean? | ITV News
It’s also timely that our Green Manifesto is launching alongside our new name too — Artists Now. Both the name and the manifesto are active, located in the present, and ask us to take action now to change the future for the better.
Inspired by Arts Council England’s challenge to embed environmental thinking in everything we do, as well as by our 46-year history supporting artists, we decided a more energetic solution — such as a manifesto — would resonate with artists.
Artists’ manifestos have long played a part in art history, from the now controversial Futurist Manifesto written in 1909 by artist Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, to the Pussy Riot Manifesto, written by artist Nadya Tolokonnikova in 2012. They shape radical new realities and proclaim creative solutions to problems.
Our Green Manifesto was written by artists (Tom Pope, Alys Scott-Hawkins and Melanie Wheeler), and it’s for artists. It’s an important call-to-action that reflects the times we live in and the climate emergency. We want to inspire a movement that creates an evolutionary change in how artists practice, and to give artists a voice to hold the industry to account.
We want to motivate and empower artists, rather than place an overwhelming burden on them to save the planet. This would be counter-productive and would more likely illicit negative thinking such as: ‘it’s too big an issue’, or ‘I can’t change anything’.
Every action, no matter how small, makes a difference. We have over 36,000 members, imagine what can be achieved if every member makes one small change towards an environmentally responsible practice.
We’ve tried to make our Green Manifesto easy to use, setting out clearly what we mean by environmental responsibility, specific calls to action, and practical steps for artists to take ranging from ‘Easy’ to ‘Most Challenging’. For example, in the ‘Easy’ section under Making, it suggests using second-hand equipment and materials.
I’m excited that we’ll be adding more artist voices and ideas to the Green Manifesto, creating a vibrant resource. We’ve had some great contributions, and to end on a positive burning-related story, see Soul of Fire (set up by two artists and based in Scotland). It produces environmentally sustainable charcoal — most charcoal is imported and they want to reverse this.
Artists are resourceful and artists make change. At Artists Now, we believe artists see things differently, offering much-needed perspectives that connect us, enrich our lives and create wonder for the world.
— Read the Green Manifesto for artists
— Julie Lomax has been the CEO for Artists Now since 2018. She’s previously been Director of Visual Arts at both Arts Council England and Creative Australia
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My curated round-up of what’s NEW to see, do, watch, read and more.
*I will earn a small commission — at no extra cost to you — when purchasing through some links in this section
EXHIBITION
1. 🔵 Portrait of a City: A Century of American Photography
Dulwich Picture Gallery, London 🇬🇧 | Now open — until 04 October
This show explores one hundred years of American urban life through the people who lived, worked, and moved through its streets. Featuring works by 34 influential photographers from 1907 to 2012, it traces how photography evolved alongside the modern city.
🔗 Read the Guardian’s four-star review
INSTALLATION
2. 🔵 Uniqlo Tate Play: Lina Lapelytė — Serendipity Island
Tate Modern, London 🇬🇧 | Now open — until 31 August
Tate Modern’s Turbine Hall has been transformed into an airport queue simulator. In the name of art of course! This year’s annual summer holiday Tate Play commission involves a wooden, maze-like installation based on security queues at airports, but with added soundscapes.
PODCAST
3. 🔵 History’s Greatest Leaders
By HistoryExtra | Listen wherever you get your podcasts
What separates an ordinary leader from one who changes history? Join entrepreneur Mike Soutar — an advisor on The Apprentice — for this new series from HistoryExtra. Expect ambition, courage and ruthlessness, as Mike explores what the stories of Elizabeth I, Winston Churchill and six other leaders can teach us in the 21st century.
EXHIBITION
4. 🔵 Gwen John: Strange Beauties
Modern Two, Edinburgh 🇬🇧 | Now open — until 04 January 2027
This year’s hit show on the Welsh modern painter moves from Cardiff to the Scottish capital. It’s the first major retrospective in over forty years dedicated to John, and marks 150 years since her birth. The Guardian called its first run “a superb, mystical retrospective.”
BOOK
5. 🔵 Hendrick ter Brugghen: Utrecht's Subtle Master
by Natasha Seaman | Published on 20 August by Lund Humphries
Hendrick ter Brugghen’s work forms a key chapter in the history of 17th-century Dutch art, yet this new book is the first accessible survey of his output. It outlines the artist’s impact on the paintings of Rembrandt and Vermeer, and how he was himself inspired by Caravaggio.
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