The Week in Art
The Week in Art
The Art Newspaper
Chernobyl 40 years on, Paula Rego at Munch in Oslo, Gluck’s flower painting
56 minutes Posted Apr 23, 2026 at 11:01 pm.
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This Sunday, 26 April, marks the 40th anniversary of the accident at the Chernobyl nuclear reactor in Soviet Ukraine. It is the most serious disaster ever to occur in the nuclear power industry, with widespread effects then and now. An exhibition at the Nikolaikirche in Potsdam, Germany, called The Chernobyl disaster: 40 years ago and yet still relevant, continues until Monday 27 April, and Ben Luke speaks to one of its organisers, Olha Kovalevska. A new exhibition at Munch, the museum in Oslo, explores the work of Paula Rego, with new research on her interest in the artist after whom the museum is named, Edvard Munch. Ben speaks to the curator of the exhibition, which is called Paula Rego: Dance Among Thorns, Kari J. Brandtzæg. And this episode’s Work of the Week is Convolvulus (1940) by Gluck, the mononymous British painter. The picture is part of the exhibition called Handpicked: Painting Flowers from 1900 to Today, which opens this weekend at Kettle’s Yard in Cambridge, UK. Ben speaks to its co-curator, Naomi Polonsky, about the work.


The Chernobyl disaster: 40 years ago and yet still relevant, Nikolaikirche, Potsdam, Germany, until 27 April.

Paula Rego – Dance Among Thorns, Munch, Oslo, 24 April-2 August; Paula Rego: Story Line, Victoria Miro, London, until 23 May.

Handpicked: Painting Flowers from 1900 to Today, Kettle’s Yard, Cambridge, 25 April-6 September


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