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Terror on the waves … Slave Ship by Marc Bauer. Photograph: Courtesy of the Artist
Art Weekly

Ghent's godlike glory, horror at sea and Britain goes baroque – the week in art

Ghent completes a magnificent restoration, Marc Bauer follows Hokusai and Géricault to sea, and a coffee controversy brews at the Tate – all in your weekly dispatch

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Exhibition of the week

British Baroque: Power and Illusion
From domes in the sky to Peter Lely’s paintings of Nell Gwynn, there was a new artistic energy in Restoration Britain.
Tate Britain, London, from 4 February to 19 April.

Also showing

Radical Figures: Painting in the New Millennium
Cecily Brown, Michael Armitage and Ryan Mosley are among the painters in this provocative survey.
Whitechapel Gallery, London, from 6 February to 10 May.

Larry Achiampong
Meditations on the African diaspora in film, sound and sculpture that mix mythology and childhood memory.
John Hansard Gallery, Southampton, until 21 March.

Marc Bauer
Drawings inspired by Hokusai and Géricault bring the perils of the sea into the gallery.
De La Warr Pavilion, Bexhill-on-Sea, from 1 February to 10 May.

Katherina Radeva
This Bulgarian-born artist and theatre designer shows works that evolved out of a performance.
Summerhall, Edinburgh, from 1 February until 1 March.

Image of the week

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Adoration of the Mystic Lamb altarpiece, by the Van Eyck brothers, in Ghent. Photograph: Kenzo Tribouillard/AFP via Getty Images

The stupendous restoration of the Ghent Altarpiece, and the magnificent exhibition nearby, confirm Van Eyck as a painting colossus. Get yourself to Belgium! Read the review.

What we learned

Today’s top architects are being employed by repressive despots

Smash and grab thieves take Salvador Dalí art from Swedish gallery

Ai Weiwei is doing a Guardian interview – send us your questions now

Times New Roman has gone viral

A row over Da Vinci’s Salvator Mundi erupts in the London Review of Books

Blockbuster shows “limit chances for minority artists” says study

Film-maker and artist Steve McQueen is still angry

Arts Council England can still be rescued from elitism …

… as its new strategy aims to foster culture in every “village, town and city”

When film-makers need the best props, they go to Welsh artist Annie Atkins

Kingston University’s new library and dance centre is a welcome sight …

… where students can find books – and romance

A striking Royal Academy show exhibits Picasso’s sacred relics

Tate Britain is hiring a “head of coffee” on £40k

Kobe Bryant has been honoured in mural form

Swiss artist Claudia Andujar fought for Brazil’s Yanomami tribe

Wolfgang Strassl is capturing people two feet underground in London

Kehinde Wiley painted Obama and was inspired by William Morris

Mary Beard offers a female perspective on nude art

A new documentary charts the life of the man who shot the Beatles’ final gig

After years of designs, Sydney Opera House is getting a $150m fix

Photographer Nancy Newberry is reimagining the spaghetti western in Texas

Ab Rogers has turned a hospital car park into a rhapsody of red

Lewis Carroll’s anarchic Alice books have been brought to musical life

Textiles are at the heart of a tangled, teasing show in London

Masterpiece of the week

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Photograph: Heritage Images/Getty Images

A Dutch Ship and Other Vessels in a Breeze, 1658, by Willem van de Velde
The Dutch navy sailed up the Medway and attacked Chatham in 1667 – sorry to spoil Brexit day, but we haven’t always ruled the seas. This painting reflects an age when Dutch sea power – and, hence, commerce – dominated. As Tate Britain unveils a show on 17th-century British art, it’s fascinating to note how we took our perceptions of the sea from Dutch painters. Van de Velde studies the oppressive clouds and iron sea with a cool, precise eye that must have pleased mariners and merchants who admired his realism – and bought it by the herring barrel. The Dutch marine art boom sailed over to Britain, too, and sea pieces like this can still be seen in bulk at the National Gallery, along with the works of JMW Turner that make the oceans English.
National Gallery, London.

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