Statue of Crouching Aphrodite (left) and an Eddie Otchere photo of Metalheadz Sunday Sessions. Composite: Guardian Design/Eddie Otchere/ The Royal Collection/ HM King Charles III View image in fullscreen Statue of Crouching Aphrodite (left) and an Eddie Otchere photo of Metalheadz Sunday Sessions. Composite: Guardian Design/Eddie Otchere/ The Royal Collection/ HM King Charles III Autumn arts preview 2026 Art and design Monet’s Riviera, 90s nostalgia and Bayeux à gogo! The best art and architecture of autumn 2026 A self-confident woman strides on to the Fourth Plinth, Nan Goldin captures sex, cats and death and even the Turner Prize shows promise this year
See all of our unmissable autumn arts recommendations here
The Bayeux tapestry The most anticipated exhibition of the year centres on an embroidered epic of war and conquest that miraculously preserves an intimate window on the Norman invasion of Britain in 1066. Yet, you may find yourself simply fascinated by the artistry of the Anglo-Saxon women who used coloured wool to depict billowing sails, charging horses and King Harold’s spectacular moustache. Jonathan Jones British Museum, London, 10 September to 11 July
This joyously comic, exuberant celebration of life on the streets – or in this case, the plinth – is likely to be a sensation. A young woman in a blue dress and blocky shoes strides boldly across the rectangular Fourth Plinth in Trafalgar Square. Her body is big in every sense, her rollicking form a surreal overstatement. An assertive, optimistic work of infectious self-confidence. JJ Fourth Plinth, Trafalgar Square, London, from 10 September
Life With a Camera is an apt description of the career of Sunil Gupta, whose portraits of anonymous gay men in Delhi, queer couples in the UK, and cruisers in New York combine a deep commitment to the principle that all forms of love and community should be made visible with a classical eye for composition. Ben Eastham Kettle’s Yard, Cambridge, 19 September to 31 January
View image in fullscreen Tragicomic tableaux … Kira Freije: Unspeak the Chorus. Photograph: Lewis Ronald This year’s Turner prize promises powerful art. Kira Freije creates tragicomic tableaux of human figures whose bodies are empty metal frames but whose faces are cast from real people; Simeon Barclay tells stories of working-class northern life through performance and sculpture; Marguerite Humeau makes sculptures out of materials such as wasp venom; and Tanoa Sasraku exhibits textiles and drawings. Should be a good one. JJ MIMA, Middlesbrough, 26 September to 29 March
When making permanent monuments has come to seem hubristic (who will be left to appreciate them?) and even irresponsible (do we really need more stuff ?), Beverly Buchanan’s tumbledown “shack sculptures” celebrate the organic processes of decay and ruin, restoring the proper hierarchy between art and nature. BE Spike Island, Bristol, 26 September to 31 January
View image in fullscreen Doing beach … Bathers by Paul Cézanne, 1890-92. Showing in Painting the French Riviera at the Royal Academy, London. Photograph: Saint Louis Art Museum, Funds given by Mrs Mark C Steinberg Artists didn’t just paint the Riviera; they helped invent it. The rise of France’s Mediterranean coast as a holiday resort from the 1870s onwards coincided with the new, savage embrace of raw sunlight by Monet and Cézanne. Matisse and the Fauves painted the Riviera in psychedelic colours, but it was Picasso who saw beach life as ero…