Critic's choice: top five exhibitions

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London life: Canaletto's Dulwich exhibition includes The City from the Terrace of Somerset House

Canaletto, Renoir and Gilbert & George are among the exhibitions well worth catching in the capital this week.

Canaletto in England
Dulwich Picture Gallery, SE1
By the time Canaletto arrived in England in 1746, his luminous paintings had made themselves at home here, brought back as Venetian souvenirs. He was to stay for nine years, installed in a Beak Street studio where he painted scenes from back home as well as London's teeming streets and enormous parks, the Thames and its warehouses, and the suburban villas of the wealthy.
(020 8693 5254). Until 15 April.

Renoir Landscapes 1865-1883
National Gallery
Landscape painting might sound stuffy these days, but to Renoir, it offered an opportunity for endless experimentation. As a young artist, he used the genre to explore composition, structure and experiment with paint. Focusing on the first two decades of his career, this exhibition shows him dabbling in innovations and passing fads, discarding or developing them until he arrives at his own aesthetic. The influences of Monet and Cezanne pass across his canvases; quick brushstrokes bring new freedom and colour intensifies as the backdrop shifts from the South of France to Italy and North Africa. The exhibition ends with a series of works created on a trip to Guernsey, by which time he'd begun to pull away from Impressionism.
(020 7747 2885). Until 20 May.

Alvar Aalto
Barbican Art Gallery, EC1
This Finnish architect was a Modernist master with an unexpectedly humanistic touch. This inspiring exhibition - his first UK retrospective - brings together models and drawings, photographs and artefacts to illustrate his achievement and relevance, zooming in on 14 key projects including museums and houses. Born in 1898, he was inspired by the Nordic landscape, and his preference for natural materials, undulating lines and cosy hues was informed by its forests and lakes - even the Northern Lights. He was just as concerned about his buildings' interiors, and designed products from stacking stools to glassware and textiles, many of which are still in production. Aalto was a lifelong admirer of Japanese architecture, and the show offers a glimpse of the work of Shigeru Ban, a Japanese architect who is famous for his use of recyclable materials such as cardboard. (0845 120 7550). Until 13 May.

Face of Fashion
National Portrait Gallery, WC2
Work by a clutch of top fashion photographers from Europe and America comes together in this stylish survey of the form. Corinne Day, well known for her work with pal Kate Moss, favours an antiglam aesthetic; Steven Klein draws out dark narratives; Paolo Roversi opts for ethereality; and Mario Sorrenti explores passions and fears. The exhibition argues that as boundaries between advertising, fine art and editorial dissolve, it's this crowd who are shaping our ideas of beauty, sexuality and fame.
Until 28 May.

Gilbert & George: Major Exhibition
Tate Modern, SE1
This gargantuan celebration of art's most dapper duo is the largest retrospective exhibition held at Tate Modern. Spanning their 40-year career, it fills 18 rooms with charcoal-on-paper "sculptures", vibrant, gridded photographs, graffiti, flowers, excrement and blood. Throughout, the figures of Gilbert and George loom, revelling in gleeful squalor and boozy bawdiness while wrestling with themes of prejudice, religious fundamentalism and violence.
Until 7 May.

 

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