John Piper was a modernist who rejected Modernism, a versatile artist who defied categories, but one who remained true to the spirit and detail of the places he painted

So Vincent van Gogh wrote to his brother Theo in October 1876, charting the latest instalment of the Holbein cult. He was renting a room in Isleworth, west London, still hoping for a religious career

There’s no shortage of great picks at this year’s TEFAF Maastricht, the Netherlands, including a Barbara Hepworth sculpture, a pastel portrait by Dora Maar and two sections of 4th-century Roman mosaics

A terrace of purpose-built studio houses has artists at work within it once again. Jeremy Musson explores the history of these buildings and a modern connection with Florence

John P. Murphy New Deal Art 336pp. Thames and Hudson. Paperback, £19.99. Seymour Fogel’s “Wealth of the Nation”, installed in 1942 in a federal building in Washington DC, depicts a group of workers en

• In March, Marthe Armitage will be 96 ...