1 The Pink Floyd Exhibition: Their Mortal Remains
The story of the psychedelic 1960s group that evolved into a wealthy business has a fable-like quality that Pink Floyd recognised themselves. They told the story of what they saw as big-time rock’s corruption and potential for alienation in songs such as Wish You Were Here and Comfortably Numb. These melancholy musings were given spectacular visual settings by arty stunts including flying an inflatable pig over Battersea Power Station and building a wall in front of the band as they played. See the props, Gerald Scarfe’s marching hammers and the ashes of a very English dream here.
Victoria & Albert Museum, SW7, 13 May to 1 October
2 Where the Thunderbird Lives
The Thunderbird features in the film Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, but it wasn’t made up by JK Rowling. This exhibition tracks the mythic creature to its home in the Pacific Northwest, whose peoples are makers of some of the US’ greatest sculpture. Images of the whale-hunting Thunderbird are among the superbly carved objects here, which include a rich variety of wooden masks. Northwestern masks can look monstrous or uncannily human – or both. These vivid interpretations of the human face are among the most haunting objects in the British Museum.
British Museum, WC1, to 27 August
3 Bruce Conner
When artists such as Robert Rauschenberg and Andy Warhol were defining New York pop art, the maverick Conner was taking his own jaundiced, ironic, west coast view of a US he saw as violent, sex-obsessed and corrupt. A Movie (1958), showing here, is one of the very first US experiments in film as art. Like his assemblages of everyday stuff, it is a collage of found images.
Thomas Dane Gallery, SW1, to 4 July
4 Anthony Caro
Some artists, like Bruce Conner, are hidden treasures; others are so lauded in their lifetimes it can be hard to see their work for the reputation that enshrouds it. The late Anthony Caro is cursed with a place in art-history textbooks for his 1960s abstract works. Can his later art be enjoyed on its own terms? Here is a chance to see.
New Art Centre, Salisbury, to 2 July
5 The Mysterious Miss Austen
The portrait that inspired Jane Austen’s image on the £10 note is among the exhibits in this exploration of the great novelist’s enigmatic personality. Austen died in Winchester in 1817 and is buried in its cathedral. She was only 41 but had already written some of most dazzling prose in the English language. A writer worth making an exhibition of.
Winchester Discovery Centre, 13 May to 24 July
