'Michelangelo was the best-remunerated artist in Italy and, like Bacon and Freud, he died a rich man. There the resemblace ends'

Is Wayne Rooney today’s Raphael? If we treated art with the same seriousness as we do sport, our visual culture could flourish again

Edouard Manet’s virtuosity in painting the human form is unsurpassed—and highly original

From beneath Berlin's streets archeaologists have unearthed a reminder of Nazi oppression