Leonardo Da Vinci, Studies of the Human Skull (1489)

He may be one of the fifteenth century’s best known scientists and empiricists, but Leonardo has become synymous with mystery and obscurantism. The smoke which blurs the features of his most famous painting, also coils around the edges of these burnt-brown anatomy drawings and the plans he made elsewhere for…

Janet Cardiff, The Forty Part Motet (2001)

When a gallery is a deconsecrated church and the artwork is a piece of religious music, walking in is a hair’s breadth from turning up for Sunday worship. It’s humbling, even humiliating. The early choral work, Spem in Alium by Thomas Tallis, is drawing people in off the street, nevertheless.…