January diary: events and exhibitions to beat the winter blues

Everyone is back at work. The mornings and evenings are dark and spring seems a mile off. We have pulled together a selection of exhibitions and events happening across the world that will help keep you inspired over the coming weeks.

Electronic Superhighway
Whitechapel Gallery, London, 29 January – 15 May 2016

A comprehensive exhibition that shows how artists have worked with the world wide web and computer technologies. Arranged in reverse chronology, the multimedia works span from the present day back to the 1960s.

Salutations Distinguées: an exhibition by Jean-Michel Tixier
Colette, Paris, until 30 January

The witty and topical drawings of Jean-Michel Tixier have always tickled our fancy and funky Paris-based shop and gallery space Colette is currently showing the extensive work he’s created with M, le magazine du Monde, which we covered at the end of last year. On until the end of the month, the show exhibits some of his best work, which provides a bold commentary on the latest cultural news and trends.

Monuments Should Not Be Trusted
Nottingham Contemporary, Nottingham, 16 January – 04 March

Bringing together over 30 artists from the “golden years” of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia this exhibition will display over 100 artworks and artefacts produced between the 1960s and 1980s. Exploring architecture, consumerism, utopias and socialism the works will be shown in the context of the social, economic and political conditions in which they were conceived.

Frank Stella: A retrospective
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, Until 7 February

Frank Stella needs little in the way of introduction, and it looks as though this retrospective is Stella by name, stellar by nature. It takes up the museum’s entire fifth floor and shows paintings, reliefs, maquettes, sculptures, and drawings from the mid 50s to the present day. 

Paris Musique Club
La Gaite Lyrique, Paris, Until 31 January

Over the past few months Paris’ Gaite Lyrique has invited a number of musicians to occupy its basement for concerts, masterclasses, screenings, dancing and workshops. Four residencies remain in January with Potemkine, Sonotown, Barbi(e)turix and Mawimbi taking over the space that has been designed by Parisian collective Scale – who have created a multimedia installation.

Cheryl Donegan: Scenes and Commercials
New Museum, New York, 20 January – 10 April

Artist Cheryl Donegan, who works across video, painting and performance, will present the work from her residency, as well as that from throughout her career, in the exhibition Cheryl Donegan: Scenes and Commercials at New York’s New Museum this month. The show will explore images from mass culture, middlebrow design and art history in exhibited works, social media video, a fashion show and concept store. 

Painting the Modern Garden – Monet to Matisse
Royal Academy of Arts, London, 30 Jan – 20 April

Like a painterly version of the RHS Chelsea Flower Show, the RA’s landmark exhibition examines the role gardens played in the evolution of art from the early 1860s through to the 1920s. Showing over 120 works, the exhibition will display paintings from Renoir, Kandinsky, Van Gogh, Monet and Matisse.