Biography:
About:
Education:
Career: joined The Guardian in 1999
Current position/role: Visual arts writer
- also writes for frieze and other art magazines
Other roles/Main role: will be on the jury for the 2009 Turner prize
Other activities:
Disclosures:
Viewpoints/Insight: Lost in a labyrinth of theory The Guardian, 23rd March 2005; Do we really live in a non-visual age? The Guardian, 12th June 2007
Broadcast media:
Video: appeared in BBC2 Television documentary series The Private Life of a Masterpiece
Controversy/Criticism: Has been criticized as "Eurocentric" see: Decolonising Persian History by Touraj Daryaee
Awards/Honours:
Scoops:
Other:
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Articles:
- Rain-soaked François Hollande is a comic, everyman leader for our times - Framing the debate: The French president is patient as his suit soaks up water. Such bumbling characters are the best fit for stormy times - 19th May 2012
- Kurt Cobain, before the age of the digital zombies - Framing the debate: As Courtney Love cedes all rights to Cobain's image, where it will be used in an age of CGI and holograms is anyone's guess - 5th May 2012
- These magazine covers are graphic examples that sex can sell feminism - Framing the debate: Does Newsweek and Foreign Policy's double act of covers objectify women or simply draw attention to good journalism? - 28th April 2012
- Racist Swedish cake, you say? Let's have a slice of the outrage - Framing the debate: As with the one of a gun-toting Pippa Middleton pal, taking an absurd picture at face value only trivialises the issues 'exposed' - 21st April 2012
- The problem with Ken Livingstone's tears - Framing the debate: There are ways to weep that seem appropriate in public life – Hillary Clinton managed it in 2008. But this just looked strange - 13th April 2012
- Blood and guts for Easter? That's not very British - Framing the debate: Passion plays in Trafalgar Square mark a departure from the milder version of Christianity that's served us post-Enlightenment - 7th April 2012
- Syria's refugees remind us of the price of revolution - Framing the debate: A lamplit portrait of a refugee family underlines the suffering that recurs when real lives are invaded by big history - 24th March 2012
- Rémi Ochlik's great photograph tells truth about the Arab spring - Framing the debate: In a moment of chaos in Libya, the late war photographer produced a rich, subtle portrait of a young revolutionary - 25th February 2012
- The Greek riots: a picture of hate - Framing the debate: Athens, the birthplace of democracy, is showing its violent side, with a philosophical ideal at war with visible reality - 18th February 2012
- Abu Qatada: portraits of hate - Framing the debate: This week's press pictures of the 'hate preacher' show that, just as in Botticelli's time, a man's face can be used against him - 10th February 2012
- Vanity Fair's new cover puts America's secret weapon on show - Framing the debate: From Rooney Mara's hair to the art deco set, Mario Testino's shot of '1920s pure beauty' shows the dream - 3rd February 2012
- The model, the yacht, the fat bloke … Kim Dotcom certainly understands the internet - Framing the debate: The founder of Megaupload controlled his image. So what does this picture tell us about him? - 28th January 2012
- Costa Concordia: an all-purpose symbol for our times - Framing the debate: Across Europe, people have shown the urge to use the stricken ship as a metaphor. Such musings help us negotiate the world - 21st January 2012
- What really links the 'urinating marines' video with Abu Ghraib - Framing the debate: In the digital age, people document and share everything – even insults to the fallen
- Can you be too ugly for politics? -If John Humphrys was criticising Ed Miliband's looks, perhaps it's because the Labour leader's inner man is not coming across - 11th January 2012
- Stephen Lawrence murder: capturing evil on camera? - Framing the debate: In this 1998 photograph of the suspects, the desire to scare and threaten overcomes any concerns with looking innocent - 7th January 2012
- Kim Jong-il on the escalator: dictatorships are going down - Framing the debate: This photo of the North Korean leader in life is as surreal as those of mass mourning for his death, but democracy has won - 23rd December 2011
- This Charlie Hebdo cover mocks Britain's true curse: class - Framing the debate: In depicting an unholy marriage of a bloodless aristocracy and a bloodthirsty working class, France has its satirical revenge - 17th December 2011
- Tahrir Square aflame: the visual basis of an imaginary revolution - Framing the debate: Ten months ago, images from Egypt's streets such as these led many to succumb to a secular liberal fantasy - 10th December 2011
- How the wild west won my affection - Comment advent calendar 2011: It is hard to reject the adventurous mythology of the west and we owe a vast part of that mythology to artists such as Remington - 5th December 2011
- Whatever happened to Tories with a difference? - Framing the debate: This photograph reminds me not just of the 80s, but hopes of a new kind of Tory - 2nd December 2011
- The Occupy movement now has its iconic image of martyrdom - The photograph of pepper-sprayed pensioner Dorli Rainey recreates the image of a humiliated Christ in a modern context - 19th November 2011
- Prince Charles and Camilla: the timeless imperial grandees - Framing the debate: The photograph of the royals re-enacting colonial nostalgia in Africa evokes the archaic nature of British identity - 11th November 2011
- Occupy's V for Vendetta protest mask is a symbol of festive citizenship - Framing the debate: The real meaning of the Guy Fawkes mask seen around the world is sophisticated, self-knowing and carnivalesque
- The west wrings its hands over dead Gaddafi photos, but war is always hell - Framing the debate: The stench of doublethink is more noxious than any vapour emerging from the meat store in Misrata - 25th October 2011
- The Occupy Wall Street image that marks the end of the global consensus - Framing the debate: Even the word 'capitalism' once seemed corny. Here, amid Times Square's corporate citadels, a monster is exposed - 18th October
- Joe Orton's defaced library books and the death of rebellious art - Framing the debate: The 1960s collages that sent two young writers to prison remind us that in today's Britain, no real dissident art is possible - 15th October 2011
- David Cameron plays the leader in front of Hugh Grant - Framing the debate: It is impossible to ignore the contrived appearance of the prime minister when you contrast him with the actor's earnestness - 7th October 2011
- How Steve Jobs made the world more beautiful - The Apple aesthetic has transformed how we see our lives – and the future - 7th October 2011
- Tony Blair, peacemaker and hate-figure - This image of Blair in Jerusalem captures a man whose globetrotting persona is very far from the party he once led - 1st October 2011
- The excess is not in alcohol but in Britain's self-loathing - Maciej Dakowicz's pictures of Cardiff revellers are lapped up by a country that pictures itself as broken, boozing, morally sick - 24th September 2011
- Photographing the Great Depression, then and now - Dorothea Lange's portraits of poverty-stricken Americans in the 1930s seem terrifyingly contemporary - 16th September 2011
- A captured beast that reminds us of a remote past - The picture of the giant crocodile caught in the Philippines is a document of the marvellous, the fearsome and the fantastic - 9th September 2011
- The Shard is a broken society's towering achievement - London's new skyscraper is a monument to wealth and power run way out of control, a flashing warning sign of disease - 19th August 2011
- A portrait of isolation, featuring Rebekah Brooks - In modern scandals the car window is a fine alienating device. Here, behind the wet glass, is one who knows the game's up - 16th July 2011
- Royal wedding: The triumph of monarchy - Republicans may think the wedding flags clumsy but Britain's royals have a keen eye for powerful imagery - 21st April 2011
- The giant awakes - American art came of age during the cold war. How did the East respond? With paintings of tractors - 18th September 2008
- A mind on fire - Francis Bacon always said he worked entirely by chance. Images found in his studio - from plucked chickens to close-ups of skin diseases - show that this was far from the case - 6th September 2008
- The British Museum deserves to be popular - But director Neil MacGregor should remember: the language of populism is crude, and the pleasures of museums subtle - Comment is free - 2nd July 2008
- Off the wall - The history of art and power has been haunted by tyrants stretching from Nero to Hitler. But was the most artistic of all Roman rulers that impossible thing, a despot with a heart? - 14th June 2008
- What would Boris's artist mum say about his train booze ban? - 15th May 2008
- My kingdom for a horse - This week five proposals were unveiled for the giant 'Angel of the South' sculpture. But one contender stands head and shoulders above the rest - 10th May 2008
- Dazzling demons - The stars of Britain's first major Klimt show will be his glittering portraits. But his darker, lost works - destroyed by the Nazis - started a revolution in 20th-century art - 7th May 2008
- Agent provocateur - The National Gallery's new boss is outspoken, defiantly high-brow and oozes learning. He is also the least pompous, most down-to-earth curator Jonathan Jones has met - 27th March 2008
- The final insult - It is our greatest monument, on a par with the pyramids. But soon it will be plagued by Tesco juggernauts. Why don't we care about Stonehenge? - 5th March 2008
- The curse of the blockbuster - Everybody loves a big show. But do Britain's huge exhibitions live up to the hype? - 28th February 2008
- The new embraceable Britain - What's behind our sudden craving for big, bold works of public art? - 18th February 2008
- If you only steal one masterpiece this year ... - 15th February 2008
- A painting fit for a president - This is George Bush's favourite work of art. He says it's heroic and inspirational. But what does it say about him? - 1st February 2008
- The shapes of things to come - Jonathan Jones on the Soviet art explosion that inspired the film's iconic poster - 1st February 2008
- Lest we forget: the war blemish - Oliver Cromwell insisted artists portray him 'warts and all'; Jonathan Yeo portrays Tony Blair war and all - 19th January 2008
- Why this is the most beautiful modern painting in the world - After a last-minute diplomatic drama, Matisse's Dance is eventually coming to Britain - for the first time. Jonathan Jones celebrates a great masterpiece and its role in the rivalry between the two giants of 20th-century art - 18th January 2008
- The eternal city - Why did Larry Gagosian choose Rome for his latest gallery? It's part of the city's long tradition of wealth championing great art - 8th January 2008
- The art - In the first decade of the 21st century modern art became a popular phenomenon - 2nd January 2008
- This week's blog: 'Where's the art that counts?' - 20th December 2007
- Art of the manager: what that £10m collection reveals - New England football manager Fabio Capello's taste in art analysed - 14th December 2007
- Hidden horror - The Isenheim Altarpiece is a masterpiece of religious art. But you'll never see it on a Christmas card- 12th December 2007
- Could Britain be on the verge of discovering a painted cave on a par with Lascaux in France? - 6th December 2007
- Who's buying these Old Moosters? - The truth is very few people really like art. This is the dirty secret that makes a living for artists such as Caroline Shotton. She is a new addition to that august company of artists who have careers, it seems, solely on the back of the joy the public takes in upsetting art critics, especially at Turner prize time - 3rd December 2007
- Tomb raiders - The treasures of Tutankhamun are the finest artistic achievement of ancient times. Why on earth have they been desecrated with papier-mache pillars and Muzak? - 15th November 2007
- The Post Office: stamping on Christianity's heritage - 7th November 2007
- Heaven on Earth - Antoni Gaudí was a fervent Catholic whose fantastical buildings burst with colour, freedom and hedonism - is he the greatest urban architect of modern times? - 20th October 2007
- The brilliant new exhibition Art and Sex raises the question: has art ever been about anything else? - 16th October 2007
- The Turner is not about beauty. And Hirst's art isn't good. But it is great - 2nd October 2007
- Mawkish masterpieces - Millais' lurid colours and trite rhetoric have been despised by critics for years. But underneath all that lies a startling emotional truth - 25th September 2007
- Paradise regained - Jardins Publics aims to put a fresh perspective on Edinburgh's leafy spaces. But is the grass really greener? - 13th August 2007
- Best of British? - Banksy is the most exciting artist to come out of the UK for more than a decade - or so many people on both sides of the Atlantic will tell you. But is he really so much more than a prankster with a spray can? - 5th July 2007
- The Helmut Newton of the 1500s - Cranach understood the dirtiness of desire. That's what made him great - 28th June 2007
- Riddle of the bog - A murder mystery preserved in peat is at the heart of the British Museum's revamped prehistoric galleries - 21st June 2007
- Is this the birth of 21st-century art? - With his shimmering skull, birth paintings and bisected shark, Damien Hirst has redeemed himself - 5th June 2007
- Beach Boy Brian Wilson is the inspiration for Tate St Ives' excellent new show of Californian art. But it's not all fun, fun, fun - 29th May 2007
- Smoke and mirrors - The cult of the artist is celebrated in a new collection of self-portraits borrowed from the Uffizi. Does it matter that half are fakes or copies? Definitely not - 22nd May 2007
- Food can be artistic - but it can never be art - 17th May 2007
- This week's blog: 'Museums are for kids, too' - 17th May 2007
- It's about knowing you'll die - Artists worked out that smoking represented death centuries before doctors did. That's why they love it so much - 14th May 2007
- Annie Leibovitz - not just a flattering celebrity snapper - 3rd May 2007
- Star spangled banners - It may be the worst decade in US history, but America's greatness is still reflected in its art - 1st May 2007
- A sea change - Antony Gormley's modern nudes, who have now found a home on Crosby Beach, are Renaissance men helping to restate human dignity - 9th March 2007
- Goya's true grandfather - Hogarth's image as a jolly satirist hides a radical genius that prefigured European modernism - 7th February 2007
- Fresh out of ideas - The problem is not Damian Hirst's borrowing from others, but his own loss of originality - 25th October 2006
- The Cook, the Tate, his waste and art lovers - The gallery was right to choose tinned excrement over fat ladies - 29th September 2006
- Column five - Rolf's secret: the Mona Lisa effect - 20th December 2005
- Brush with a revolutionary - You no longer have to be a conference delegate to view the great works of the artist James Barry - 12th December 2005
- The place to fall in love - No other gallery can compete with the Musée Picasso for putting passion into modern art - 8th November 2005
- A picture of poor taste - Vettriano is not an artist. His textureless, brainless corpses of paintings just happen to be popular - 5th October 2005
- Dearth in Venice - The Biennale has no place in the city of Titian's greatest works, where artists invite comparison with genius - 10th June 2005
- What the Middle Ages did for us - As the world slips back into cycles of holy war and revenge, the film Kingdom of Heaven suggests a solution - 10th May 2005
- Blake's heaven - Only one British artist would make it on to a list of the world's all-time greatest - 25th April 2005
- Admire the stage instead - Michelangelo's personality dominates every Vatican scene but his theology attracts less attention - 6th April 2005
- Lost in a labyrinth of theory - Art today likes to think of itself as very, very clever. I understand the insecurity, but it does little for the work - 23rd March 2005
- A Georgian invention - One universally accepted fact in the blood sports debate is a lie - that foxhunting has history on its side - 22nd November 2004
- I'd rather open a boutique - Who is the BBC's new Culture Show for? Certainly not those who are genuinely passionate about art - 13th November 2004
- Death of a legend - Strip the tale of King Arthur of its chivalry and sorcery and what is left is nothing sort of a national insult - 23rd August 2004
- Dim, cloned conservatives - Modern graffiti is not subversive - it is a formulaic, bankrupt cliche - 7th August 2004
- All the lonely people - The paintings of Edward Hopper evoke an emptiness that is still pervasive in American everyday life - 19th May 2004
- Aborigines are wrong about Harry - The prince's art is ridiculous, but it derives from the modernist sublime - 20th August 2003
- Take the ego out of art - Simon Rattle is right - Britain has a lot to learn from the high seriousness of Germany's cultural life - 26th August 2002
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