Pierre d’Alancaisez on Art STERLING RUBY/MATT CHUNG; GAVIN ...

From George Stubbs’s golden vision of the labourer’s place in society to Ford Madox Brown’s heroically monumental celebration of manual labour, artists gave individual interpretations of work, as Michael Hall reveals

In 1966, THE VELVET UNDERGROUND AND NICO brought together the worlds of avant-garde art, European cool and downtown rock’n’roll in one explosive package. Sixty years on, the survivors share tales of drugs, breakdowns, burnouts, blocked toilets and hospital beds – and, of course, the creation of some of the most important music ever made. “We only did things our way,” learns Tom Pinnock . “We were arrogant, perhaps, in thinking we knew best. We were also right. We did know best…”

Michaelina Wautier is one of the most compelling rediscoveries in Baroque painting. Working in 17th-century Brussels, she tackled subjects usually reserved for men, producing still lifes, portraits an

Catherine Clarke A History of England in 25 Poems400pp. Allen Lane. £25. Mark Forsyth Rhyme and ReasonA short history of poetry and people (forpeople who don’t usually read poetry)368pp. Allen & Unwin

BRAFA, the annual art and antiques fair held in the Belgian capital, remains alluring at 71 years of age by combining old favourites with new discoveries